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THE   INTERPRETATION 
OF   NATURE 


BY 


NATHANIEL  SOUTHGATE  SHALER 

PROFESSOR  OF  GEOLOGY  IN   HARVARD  UNIVERSITY 


BOSTON   AND   NEW  YORK    • 
HOUGHTON,  MIFFLIN   AND   COMPANY 
(Cfre  Cttorrei&e  $rE80,  Cambridge 
1899 


7  I 


Copyright,  1893, 
BY  NATHANIEL  SOUTHGATE  SHALBR. 

All  rights  reserved. 


FIFTH    IMPRESSION- 


The  Riverside  Press,  Cambridge,  Mass.,  U.S.A. 
Electrotyped  and  Printed  by  H.  O.  Houghton  &  Company. 


PREFACE. 


THIS  volume  contains,  with  slight  modi- 
fication, the  course  of  lectures  on  the 
Winkley  foundation  which  I  delivered  be- 
fore the  students  of  Andover  Theological 
Seminary  in  1891.  At  the  outset  I  ad- 
dressed a  few  words  to  my  audience  with 
the  purpose  of  putting  myself  en  rapport 
with  them,  and  with  the  same  intention 
I  address  my  readers  in  the  same  terms  in 
this  preliminary  note. 

It  seems  desirable  to  preface  the  book 
which  I  offer  to  you  with  some  general 
account  of  its  plan.  When  I  was  asked 
to  undertake  this  task,  I  was  conscious  of 
the  difficulties  which  I  should  encounter 
in  the  work,  and  was  at  first  disposed  to 
be  daunted  by  them.  You  all  know  that 

220884 


iv  PREFACE. 

the  relations  between  natural  science  and 
religion  are  somewhat  strained.  Natural- 
ists generally  have  rather  a  bad  name 
among  theologians,  and  those  students  of 
the  phenomenal  world  who  have  ventured 
to  write  about  religious  matters  have 
rarely  won  laurels  from  their  friends  on 
either  side.  I  was  led  to  prevail  over  my 
fears  by  the  considerations  which  I  shall 
now  briefly  present  as  follows  :  — 

My  first  contact  with  natural  science 
.in  my  youth  and  early  manhood  had  the 
not  uncommon  effect  of  leading  me  far 
away  from  Christianity.  Of  late  years  a 
further  insight  into  the  truths  of  nature 
has  gradually  forced  me  once  again  to- 
wards the  ground  from  which  I  had 
departed. 

Although  the  individual  man  is  apt  to 
overestimate  the  importance  of  his  mental 
history,  I  think  I  am  not  mistaken  in  be- 
lieving that  my  own  experience,  in  a  way, 
represents  the  course  which  many  other 
naturalists  are  more  or  less  consciously 


PREFACE.  V 

following.  Beginning  with  the  simpler 
and  apparently  mechanical  facts  with 
which  they  have  to  deal,  inquirers  into 
phenomena  are,  at  first,  almost  necessarily 
led  to  conceive  nature  as  a  great  engine, 
which  can  be  explained  as  we  account 
for  a  combination  of  wheels  and  levers. 
Gradually,  as  they  are  forced  to  more  ex- 
tended views  of  their  subject-matter,  they 
perceive  that  this  simple  explanation  is 
unsatisfactory.  Without  conscious  argu- 
ment, moved  merely  by  the  weight  of  the 
truths  which  are  insensibly  driven  in  upon 
them,  they  find  their  conceptions  enlarg- 
ing ;  they  are  compelled  to  suppose  a 
kind  of  control  operating  in  their  world 
which  is  not  purely  dynamic.  When  they 
attain  this  position,  it  seems  to  me  time 
for  them  to  examine  the  ground  they 
occupy,  with  a  view  to  finding  what  is  its 
relation  to  that  held  by  the  older  schools 
of  interpretation,  those  which  we  call  the 
theologic.  The  matter  which  I  have  to 
present  to  you  is  directed  to  this  end. 


Vi  PREFACE. 

After  consideration,  I  determined  not  to 
try  to  undertake  a  connected  argument 
concerning  the  relations  of  science  and 
religion,  but  rather  to  take  up  certain 
leading  questions  which  have  at  once  a 
relation  to  natural  history  and  to  theol- 
ogy. In  this  presentation  I  approach  the 
matter  altogether  from  my  own  point  of 
view,  my  aim  being  to  show  the  state  of 
mind  to  which  the  student  of  phenomena 
is  brought  by  influences  which  are  entirely 
independent  of  theological  opinions. 

Two  of  the  topics  which  I  treat,  those 
concerning  critical  points  in  nature  and 
sympathy,  have  already  had  some  pre- 
sentation in  print,  but  the  articles  have 
been  revised  and  rewritten  for  use  in  this 
series. 


CONTENTS. 


CHAPTER  I. 

THE  APPRECIATION  OF  NATURE I 

Effect  of  the  veil  of  the  commonplace  in  limit- 
ing our  understandings.  The  greater  part  of  our 
intellectual  work  employed  in  trying  to  ascer- 
tain and  rationalize  what  is  going  on  in  the  world 
about  us.  This  interpretation  of  nature  begun  in 
the  remote  progenitors  of  man ;  marked  by  the 
curiosity  exhibited  by  the  lower  animals.  Stages 
of  growth  of  this  motive  in  the  lower  animals 
and  in  man.  Origin  of  the  theologic  interpre- 
tation of  nature.  Why  at  first  animistic  or  poly- 
theistic. The  way  in  which  the  scientific  inter- 
pretation began.  Relation  of  the  natural  cate- 
gory to  the  god  in  the  polytheistic  system. 
Stages  of  development  of  this  change.  Its  devel- 
opment peculiar  to  the  Greeks.  Place  of  Plato 
and  Aristotle  in  originating  the  natural  interpre- 
tation of  the  Universe.  Contrast  between  the  spirit 
of  inquiry  in  the  civilizations  of  Greece  and  Rome. 
Effect  on  Christianity  and  science  arising  from 
the  dominance  of  the  Roman  spirit.  Modern 
revival  of  natural  science.  Influence  of  Greek 
learning  in  the  Renaissance  and  in  recent  centu- 
ries. Limitation  of  scientific  spirit  to  the  Aryan 


Vlll  CONTENTS. 

people.    Outcome  of  the  debate  between  super- 
naturalists  and  naturalists. 


CHAPTER   II. 

CRITICAL  POINTS  IN  THE  CONTINUITY  OF  NATURAL 
PHENOMENA 50 

Effect  of  the  modern  idea  as  to  the  continuity 
of  causation  ;  genesis  of  this  idea ;  limitations  as 
to  its  validity.  Evident  conditions  of  action  in 
nature.  Essential  individualization  of  elements 
and  compounds.  Sudden  alterations  in  the  course 
of  natural  action:  Meaning  of  the  term  "  criti- 
cal point."  Mathematical  and  physical  illustra- 
tions of  the  principle.  Discussion  of  the  critical 
points  of  water  at  various  places  in  the  scale  of 
temperature. 

Relation  of  critical  points  of  the  various  sub- 
stances to  each  other.  Effect  of  these  relations 
in  producing  unpredictable  results.  Sudden 
changes  in  the  courses  of  action  brought  about  in 
this  way.  Extent  to  which  the  development  of 
organic  life  on  the  earth  has  depended  upon  the 
adjustment  of  critical  points  in  relation  to  each 
other.  Influence  of  these  considerations  in  limit- 
ing our  conceptions  as  to  the  nature  of  causation. 

Effect  of  critical  points  in  determining  the  de- 
velopment of  the  organic  series.  Nature  of  in- 
herited motives.  Illustration  from  polydactylism. 
Limitation  of  our  conceptions  in  this  field  of 
inquiry.  Critical  points  in  the  conflict  of  inher- 
itances. Place  of  the  notion  of  critical  points  in 
moral  development.  Illustrations  from  history, 
of  peoples  and  of  individual  men.  Effect  of  these 
views  upon  our  conception  as  to  the  order  of 
nature. 


CONTENTS.        „  ik 


CHAPTER  III. 

THE  PLACE  OF  ORGANIC  LIFE  IN  NATURE     .    .  103 

Moral  effect  of  the  advancement  of  science. 
The  influence  of  the  evolutionary  hypothesis.  In- 
fluence of  this  knowledge  of  natural  science  on 
the  conceptions  of  death.  Differences  between 
inorganic  and  organic  individualities.  Limitations 
in  the  development  of  organic  forms,  measured 
in  terms  of  space,  time,  and  the  mass  of  the  ma- 
terial in  the  visible  universe.  Painful  nature  of 
these  conceptions.  The  reason  why  they  are  re- 
volting to  us. 

Effect  of  self-consciousness  on  the  attitude  of 
man  towards  nature.  Dangers  connected  with 
the  transition  from  the  old  view  of  nature  to  the 
new.  Probable  outcome  of  the  naturalistic  ten- 
dencies. 

CHAPTER  IV. 

THE  MARCH  OF  THE  GENERATIONS 142 

The  impulse  towards  organization  in  nature. 
The  life  of  animals  and  plants  only  a  higher  stage 
of  the  development  begun  in  the  inorganic  world. 
Organic  forms  differ  from  inorganic  in  ability  to 
inherit  experience.  Effect  of  this  ability  indicated 
in  the  variation  of  organic  units.  Relation  of 
birth  and  death  to  the  principle  of  inheritance. 

General  principles  of  organic  advance.  The 
meaning  of  "  species."  Variations  in  the  rate  of 
change.  Difficulties  which  beset  organic  ad- 
vance.  Seldom  nature  of  great  successes.  Con- 
ditions  which  determined  the  development  of 
man.  Nature  of  the  control  in  his  evolution, 


X  CONTENTS. 

CHAPTER  V. 

THE  BOND  OF  THE  GENERATIONS §91 

Peculiar  needs  of  organic  forms  which  are  made 
necessary  by  the  system  of  generational  succes- 
sion. Physical  contrivances  for  bridging  the  gap 
of  death.  Development  of  the  sympathetic  bond. 
Of  the  husbanding  habit.  Advance  of  the  care- 
taking  motive  among  men.  Development  of  the 
institutions  of  society.  Evolution  of  the  family 
motive;  of  education.  Value  of  the  social  store. 
Relation  of  human  evolution  to  that  of  the  lower 
life.  Place  of  rationality  in  this  group  of  instinc- 
tive actions.  Modification  of  our  view  of  death. 
Effect  of  these  considerations  on  our  view  of  edu- 
cation. Place  of  moral  teaching  in  education. 

CHAPTER  VI. 

THE  NATURAL  HISTORY  OF  SYMPATHY  .    .    .    .232 

Difficulty  in  explaining  the  development  of  al- 
truism by  the  selective  hypothesis.  Various  forms 
of  the  altruistic  motive.  "With  fellow-beings, 
with  God,  with  the  beautiful  in  nature.  Difficul- 
ties of  the  inquiry.  Stages  in  the  development 
of  sympathy  in  the  organic  groups.  Instinctive 
method  of  the  beehive  and  ant-hill.  Partly  ra- 
tionalized motives  in  the  mammalia.  Extension 
of  the  motive  as  we  rise  in  the  scale  of  organiza- 
tion. Extraordinary  increase  of  it  among  men. 
Cause  of  this  advance.  Future  development  of 
the  altruistic  motive.  Relation  to  religion  ;  to  the 
evil  of  self-consciousness.  Natural  place  of  the 
Christian  religion  as  determined  by  the  foregoing 
considerations. 


CONTENTS.  JLl 

CHAPTER  VII. 

THE  IMMORTALITY  OF  THE  SOUL  FROM  THE  POINT 

OF  VIEW  OF  NATURAL  SCIENCE 278 

Undue  weight  given  to  the  opinions  of  scien- 
tific men  concerning  immortality.  Brief  account 
of  the  scientific  view  of  this  problem.  Original 
prepossession  as  to  the  definite  nature  of  scientific 
knowledge.  Advancing  distrust  in  the  relevancy 
of  the  ancient  arguments  against  immortality. 
Old  view  as  to  the  nature  of  matter  now  in  doubt. 
Effects  arising  from  the  study  of  the  phenomena 
of  inheritance.  Difficulties  of  the  mechanical 
view  in  the  light  of  these  facts.  Molecular  na- 
ture of  the  bridge  from  generation  to  generation. 
Effect  of  natural  science  in  decreasing  interest  in 
immortality.  Judgment  from  the  course  of  nature 
in  favor  of  a  life  beyond  the  body.  Summary 
and  conclusion. 


THE 
INTERPRETATION   OF   NATURE. 


CHAPTER  I. 

THE   APPRECIATION    OF   NATURE. 

THE  most  that  men  do  in  the  routine  of 
'  their  daily  life  is  so  masked  by  habit  that 
they  fail  to  see  how  they  are  moved  to 
their  deeds.  The  veil  of  the  common- 
place is  so  thick  that  it  admits  no  more 
light  than  just  enough  to  show  us  where 
to  place  our  feet.  It  reveals  nothing  of 
the  way  behind  us  or  that  which  is  far 
before.  It  therefore  requires  a  good  deal 
of  careful  thinking  to  secure  an  adequate 
notion  of  what  we  are  really  about  in  the 
ceaseless  activities  of  our  days.  With  a 
little  pains  a  man  may  make  a  list  of  all 
his  actions  during  a  single  day ;  it  would, 


2        THE  APPRECIATION  OF  NATURE. 

however,  puzzle  the  most  introspective 
philosopher  to  accomplish  the  more  im- 
portant task  of  determining  what  were 
the  mental  processes  which  led  him  to  the 
several  activities.  It  is  doubtful  if  such 
an  analysis  is  within  the  limits  of  human 
ability.  In  such  an  effort  we  can  at  best 
discern  enough  to  show  us  some  general 
trends  of  our  thought ;  something  of 
those  tendencies  is  indeed  evident  on  a 
very  little  self  -  inquiry.  One  of  these 
which  is  marked  in  every  man's  mind  is 
to  be  the  subject  of  our  consideration. 

If  we  examine  the  processes  of  our 
intellects,  such  at  least  as  go  on  while  we 
are  completely  conscious,  we  note  that  we 
are  principally  employed  in  trying  to  as- 
certain and  rationalize  what  is  going  on  in 
the  world  about  us.  For  the  larger  part 
of  our  waking  time  we  are  attending  to 
the  sensations  which  come  to  us  on  the 
several  lines  by  which  we  gain  a  know- 
ledge of  the  matters  beyond  ourselves. 
Each  distinct  effect  on  the  sensorium, 


INTERPRETING   OUR  SENSATIONS.       3 

arising  from  light,  from  sound,  from  odors 
or  other  phenomena,  as  it  is  seized  on  by 
consciousness,  is  at  once  interpreted  and 
classed,  so  that  we  feel  that  it  falls  into  a 
fit  place  in  our  understanding.  As  long 
as  this  simple,  every-day,  or  rather  every- 
instant  duty  is  easily  accomplished,  the 
work  lies  in  the  domain  of  the  habitual, 
and  does  not  more  than  momentarily, 
generally  most  imperfectly,  affect  our  con- 
sciousness. We  then  deal  with  the  im- 
pressions which  are  thrust  upon  us  as  a 
well-trained  fencer  does  with  the  assaults 
of  an  antagonist.  We  instinctively  meet 
them  without  a  knowledge  of  our  action. 
In  an  ordinary  day  we  may  reasonably 
estimate  that  a  man  with  moderately 
quick  wits  devises  many  thousands  of 
these  simple  explanations,  which  are  se- 
cured by  a  quick  classification  of  the  im- 
pression, and  its  reference  to  an  appro- 
priate category.  On  his  success  in  this 
unconscious  endeavor  his  individual  life 
depends,  as  that  of  his  ancestors,  human 


4        THE  APPRECIATION  OF  NATURE. 

and  brute,  for  inconceivably  many  genera- 
tions has  absolutely  depended. 

This  interpretation  of  the  nature  about 
his  individual  life  which  is  so  conspicuous 
in  man  began  in  his  remote  progenitors. 
It  is  first  manifested  in  simple  reactions 
which  are  termed  "  reflex  "  movements,  by 
means  of  which,  apparently  without  the 
exercise  of  any  distinct  intelligence,  the 
lowly  creature  avoided  dangers,  sought  its 
food,  and  recognized  its  mates.  Gradually 
these  actions,  apparently  so  simple  that 
some  speculators  have  termed  them  auto- 
matic, rise  in  their  grade.  The  advance 
is  so  gradual  that  between  purely  reflex 
action  and  consciously  intelligent  work  no 
distinct  line  can  be  drawn.  We  can  only 
say  that  by  insensible  gradations  what 
was  apparently  an  automaton  becomes  a 
conscious  creature.  When  this  stage  of 
consciousness  is  attained,  the  reactions  are 
complicated  with  distinct  motives  and  in- 
fluenced by  more  or  less  definite  memo- 
ries. Finally  in  man,  the  appreciation  of 


THE  ADVENT  OF  CURIOSITY.  5 

nature,  with  the  advent  of  self-conscious- 
ness, rises  to  a  higher  plane,  perhaps  the 
loftiest  to  which  intelligence  is  to  attain 
upon  this  sphere.  It  is  outside  our  pur- 
pose to  consider  the  stages  by  which  the 
merely  reflex  movements  relative  to  the 
environment,  such  as  may  be  exhibited  by 
an  amoeba  or  by  a  decapitated  frog,  grad- 
ually become  uplifted  to  the  plane  of 
conscious  inquiry.  The  history  of  this 
development  seems  to  me  a  matter  which 
must  for  the  present,  and  possibly  forever, 
remain  inscrutable.  We  need,  however, 
to  note  that  with  the  advent  of  conscious 
intelligence  there  comes  that  motive  called 
curiosity,  —  the  impulse  which  leads  the 
creature  to  demand  explanation  of  the 
world  about  it.  It  is  clear  that  curiosity 
is  a  very  intense  motive  in  the  life  of  a 
host  of  creatures  below  the  level  of  man. 
It  is  indeed  tolerably  evident  among  all 
the  vertebrates  where  the  intellectual  fac- 
ulties are  sufficiently  developed  to  enable 
us  to  study  their  mental  parts.  If  we  are 


6        THE  APPRECIA  TION  OF  NA  TURE. 

observant  we  may,  in  any  walk  through 
the  woods  and  fields,  note  this  motive 
among  animals,  and  observe  how  it  con- 
tends against  the  more  primal  impulse  of 
fear.  The  skilled  hunter  knows  well  that 
it  is  in  certain  creatures  a  stronger  lure 
than  hunger ;  that  it  will  often  tempt 
the  most  timid  animal  to  its  death. 

In  the  groups  of  animals  in  which  the 
mental  powers  are  only  moderately  devel- 
oped, as  in  the  ordinary  creatures  of  our 
flocks  and  herds,  this  element  of  curiosity 
appears  to  be  related  mainly  to  phenomena 
exhibited  by  other  animals  or  by  objects 
which  they  may  presume  to  be  of  an  ani- 
mal nature.  Thus  the  half-wild  cattle  of 
the  plains  will  crowd  about  a  footman, 
while  they  will  not  notice  a  man  on  horse- 
back. They  are  unaccustomed  to  the 
spectacle  of  a  man  afoot,  and  it  needs  to 
be  explained  to  their  minds.  A  mounted 
man  is  to  them  a  familiar  object.  They 
exhibit  no  strong  desire  to  examine  into 
the  details  of  any  other  objects  save  those 


CURIOSITY  IN  ANIMALS:  7 

which  appear  to  be  animated.  It  is  other- 
wise with  monkeys.  These  animals  have 
the  interrogative  spirit  developed  in  a  sur- 
prisingly intense  manner,  and  it  extends 
to  a  very  wide  range  of  facts.  Their  well- 
known  mischievous  spirit  mainly  arises 
from  the  desire  to  attain  to  some  under- 
standing of  the  things  with  which  they 
come  in  contact.  The  gratification  of  this 
impulse  in  the  apes  can  hardly  appear 
to  the  more  exalted  selectionists  as  the 
result  of  any  advantage  which  the  crea- 
tures' ancestors  have  won  from  the  exer- 
cise of  the  habit.  So  far  as  the  profit  is 
concerned,  it  is  clearly  better  for  the  ani- 
mal to  indulge  in  the  impulse  of  fear 
and  flee  from  any  novel  apparition,  rather 
than  to  approach  what  may  prove  to  be  a 
serious  danger.  We  must  therefore  re 
gard  the  motive  of  curiosity  which  is  evi- 
dent in  so  many  of  the  lower  animals  and 
becomes  so  exceedingly  well  developed  in 
the  higher  groups  of  the  infra -human 
mammals  as  something  which  is  not  to 


8        THE  APPRECIATION  OF  NATURE. 

be  accounted  for  by  the  Darwinian  hypo- 
thesis. 

These  considerations,  when  properly 
dealt  with,  serve  to  show  us  that  we  are 
not  in  any  way  distinguished  from  our 
immediate  kindred  among  the  lower  ani- 
mals as  regards  the  fundamental  habits 
which  determine  our  intellectual  relations 
to  environment.  Both  man  and  the  more 
intelligent  beasts  similarly  receive  this 
store  of  impressions  from  the  outer  world. 
They  alike  give  them  an  interpretation 
from  their  previous  experience ;  they  alike 
have  built  upon  this  primitive  habit  the 
peculiar  superstructure  which  we  term  cu- 
riosity, that  is,  the  desire  to  seek  even  at 
the  cost  of  labor  and  danger  the  explana- 
tion of  phenomena  which  are  not  at  once 
to  be  accounted  for  by  the  store  of  re- 
membered experiences. 

Although  there  can  be  no  doubt  that 
the  motive  which  leads  men  to  interpret 
nature  had  its  foundations  laid  in  the 
grades  of  being  much  below  the  level  of 


DEVELOPMENT  OF  CURIOSITY.  9 

humanity,  it  is  clear  that  the  impulse  is 
vastly  developed  along  the  line  of  passage 
from  the  lower  to  the  higher  estate  of 
being.  The  most  imperfectly  educated 
savage,  as  for  instance  the  Andaman  Is- 
lander or  the  Hottentot,  doubtless  gains 
a  far  higher  grade  of  thought  in  his  expla- 
nation of  nature  than  the  ablest  ape  or 
other  inferior  animal,  and  his  curiosity  is 
doubtless  cast  in  a  much  more  logical 
form  than  that  of  his  lowly  kinsman. 
The  beast,  when  startled  by  an  unusual 
sound  or  sight,  probably  at  the  moment 
uses  a  certain  kind  of  logic  in  its  mental 
processes ;  by  its  individual  experience 
and  the  store  which  it  has  inherited  from 
its  ancestors,  unexplained  sounds  and 
sights  come  to  be  associated  with  danger, 
and  so  the  motives  of  fear  and  curiosity 
are  aroused.  My  horse  is  startled  by  the 
appearance  of  a  bit  of  paper  stirred  by 
the  wind.  The  awakening  of  his  fear  is 
doubtless  due  to  the  fact  that  his  mind 
associates  movement  on  the  part  of  any 


IO       THE  APPRECIATION  OF  NATURE. 

object  with  possibly  dangerous  character- 
istics. His  detailed  memory  and  his 
power  of  associating  ideas  being  weak,  he 
cannot  at  once  class  the  object  with  the 
things  which  he  knows  are  not  harmful. 
If  I  hold  him  in  the  face  of  the  object 
until  he  can  slowly  gather  its  character- 
istics, he  will  be  enabled  to  classify  it  as 
innocuous.  When  the  impression  has  been 
frequently  repeated,  a  general  notion  is 
formed ;  the  creature,  as  we  say,  becomes 
accustomed  to  the  thing. 

Among  men,  even  among  the  lowest 
savages,  this  process  of  generalizing  the 
material  afforded  by  the  consciousness 
proceeds  with  vastly  greater  speed  than  in 
any  of  the  lower  creatures  and  attains  to 
a  far  more  advanced  state ;  the  curiosity 
likewise  is  more  penetrative.  It  is  not 
satisfied  with  the  simple  conclusions  which 
the  beast  secures,  but  it  demands  a  vastly 
greater  measure  of  explanation  as  to  the 
meaning  of  the  phenomena.  It  inquires 
as  to  causes.  The  horse  is  content  when 


THE  IDEA   OF  CAUSATION.  II 

the  bit  of  moving  paper  is  classed  with 
the  things  which  are  not  likely  to  do  him 
harm.  In  fact,  so  far  as  we  can  see  from 
the  actions  of  the  creature,  he  is  satisfied 
with  the  division  of  the  surrounding  world 
into  the  three  simple  categories  of  things 
to  himself  beneficial,  harmful,  and  inert. 
The  essentially  human  question  which,  so 
far  as  we  can  see,  is  never  asked  by  the 
lower  animals,  is,  "  How  did  this  action 
come  about  ? "  "  What  caused  the  event  ? " 
Indeed,  this  question  is  asked  in  the  lower 
men  only  in  those  cases  where  the  ac- 
tion is  in  some  way  forced  on  their  atten- 
tion ;  the  idea  of  causation  with  reference 
to  the  great  mass  of  events  in  nature 
which  are  neither  friendly  nor  hurtful  to 
them,  but  simply  indifferent,  appears  to  be 
limited  to  more  advanced  peoples. 

Although  we  cannot  see  the  origin  of 
this  motive  which  we  term  curiosity,  it  is 
easy  to  perceive  that  man  inherits,  the  im- 
pulse from  prehuman  stages  of  thought 
and  action,  and  that  the  later  time  has 


12       THE  APPRECIATION  OF  NATURE. 

only  served  to  elevate  and  extend  the 
modes  of  its  operation.  In  the  first  form 
the  interest  in  the  unknown  was  of  a 
blind  sort;  seeking  no  further  gratifica- 
tion than  that  which  the  simplest  possible 
classification  can  afford,  —  a  classification 
which  has  reference  to  the  individual 
needs  alone.  In  the  primitive  man  and 
in  children  we  see  this  shapeless  and  pur- 
poseless state  of  the  motive,  which  seems 
to  indicate  its  remote  and  animal  origin. 
In  the  savage,  even  of  the  lowest  sort,  this 
spirit  has  led  to  some  attempt  at  ration- 
alizing the  world.  The  first  step  toward 
this  great  human  enterprise  appears  to 
have  been  independently  taken  by  a  great 
number  of  separate  peoples,  but  it  is  al- 
ways in  one  direction.  The  natural  action 
demanding  explanation  is  inevitably  ac- 
counted for  by  the  supposition  that  it  is 
caused  by  the  will  of  some  being  like 
those  with  whom  the  man  has  come  in 
contact.  In  what  may  be  its  simplest 
form  this  explanation  assumes  that  wind? 


THE   CONTROL   OF  EVENTS.  13 

are  caused,  say  by  the  motion  of  the 
wings  of  a  bird,  experience  having  shown 
that  the  air  can  be  moved .  in  this  manner, 
or  the  action  may  be  accounted  for  on 
the  supposition  that  it  is  due  to  the  breath 
of  some  animal.  Still  further  it  may  be 
assumed  that  the  motion  is  brought  about 
by  a  humanlike  being  in  some  one  of  the 
many  ways  in  which  man  may  stir  the 
air.  Very  often,  though  at  what  seems  to 
me  to  be  a  later  stage  in  the  process  of 
thought,  the  phenomenon  is  accounted  for 
on  the  supposition  that  it  is  controlled  by 
the  departed  spirits  of  men. 

Early  in  the  organization  of  society  the 
abler  members  of  the  tribe  stand  apart 
from  their  fellows  by  their  strength  of 
body  or  of  mind.  They  are  reverenced 
for  their  power.  When  they  die  it  is 
natural  for  their  kindred  to  suppose  that 
they  remain  about  their  former  dwelling- 
place  and  continue  to  show  their .  ability 
by  the  control  of  events  which  affect  their 
kindred. 


14      THE   APPRECIATION  OF  NATURE. 

We  cannot  here  trace  the  wide  exten- 
sion of  this  belief  which  assigns  the  con- 
trol of  the  world  to  the  spirits  of  the  de- 
parted ;  it  was  a  natural  and  noble  view. 
It  did  much  to  reconcile  man  to  nature ; 
it  seems  to  me  to  have  been  the  founda- 
tion of  all  our  higher  interpretation  of  the 
universe :  the  basis  of  both  the  theolo- 
gical and  scientific  explanations  of  the 
order  of  events.  It  is  very  difficult  for  us 
to  hark  back  in  imagination  to  the  state 
of  men  before  either  religion  or  science 
had  taken  shape.  Yet  we  should  endea- 
vor to  conceive  the  primitive  man  with 
a  dawning  consciousness  of  the  mystery 
about  him  ;  with  a  keen  sense  of  the  dan- 
gers of  the  present  and  of  the  hereafter ; 
with  experiences  which  led  him  to  the 
belief  that  the  world  was  a  vast  brutal 
enemy  of  his  fondest  hopes  and  desires. 
In  the  maze  of  phenomena  he  beheld  a 
few  traces  of  order.  The  days  and  sea- 
sons succeeded  each  other,  animals  and 
plants  brought  forth  after  their  kind,  the 


THE  MONOTHEISTIC  IDE^.  15 

streams  flowed  on  forever.  Even  the  evils 
which  afflicted  him  were  evidently  in 
their  nature  ordered  or  successive.  When 
these  elements  of  obscure  order  were 
explained  by  the  supposition  that  they 
were  the  result  of  the  will  of  beings  essen- 
tially like  himself,  a  great  step  towards  an 
intellectual  and  moral  life  was  made.  It 
is  true  that  the  great  mass  of  phenomena 
which  the  world  exhibited  was  still  unac- 
counted for  :  the  hypothesis  was,  indeed, 
inadequate,  but  a  beginning  was  made, 
and  with  the  advance  in  culture  the  con- 
quest was  rapidly  extended. 

Beginning  with  this  animistic  or  poly- 
theistic explanation  of  the  orderly  parts 
of  the  phenomenal  world,  the  natural  path 
of  thought  —  a  path  trodden,  it  is  true,  by 
few  peoples  —  inevitably  leads  to  a  more 
united  and  more  monotheistic  view  of  the 
universe.  Where  gained  at  all,  the  mono- 
theistic idea  is  but  slowly  acquired,  yet 
it  logically  follows  with  the  advance  in 
philosophic  capacity.  The  subordinated 


1 6     THE  APPRECIATION  OF  NATURE. 

intelligences  which  regulated  events  were 
gradually  represented  as  under  superior 
control,  something  like  a  hierarchy  of 
powers  was  conceived  one  above  another, 
until  the  great  conception  was  completed 
in  the  unique  idea  of  a  Supreme  Being 
who  used  the  lesser  powers  as  the  agents 
of  his  will.  Gradually  the  grosser  human 
attributes  were  removed  from  the  concep- 
tion of  this  omnipotence,  and  he  stands 
apart  from  man  in  all  save  those  qualities 
which  men  regard  as  Godlike.  When  this 
idea  of  nature  is  attained,  even  while  the 
polytheistic  stage  alone  exists,  the  mo- 
tive of  curiosity,  partially  allayed  by  the 
animistic  conception,  begins  again  to  find 
itself  unsatisfied.  The  fact  is,  the  theo- 
logic  explanation  of  nature  gives  scant 
room  for  the  exercise  of  this  motive. 
This  explanation  necessarily  dwells  on 
large  matters  which  are  to  be  accepted  on 
the  basis  of  faith  alone ;  it  cannot  con- 
cern itself  with  the  exploration  of  the  very 
detailed  happenings  which  meet  the  eye. 


THE  SCIENTIFIC  MOTIVE.  If 

That  it  is  the  will  of  God  that  things  are 
so  does  not  satisfy  the  impulse  which 
seeks  to  know  the  "how"  and  the  imme- 
diate "why"  of  the  matter.  Thus  the 
spirit  of  inquiry  which  led  to  the  institu- 
tion of  the  first  explanation  of  the  visible 
world  finds  in  time  that  it  has  scant  place 
in  the  theologic  realm  :  it  therefore  re- 
turns to  its  natural  quest  and  begins  its 
inquiries  anew. 

Starting  with  the  theologic  conception 
which  is  apparently  the  necessary  product 
of  the  first  series  of  efforts  to  explain  the 
order  of  the  universe,  the  curious  spirit 
necessarily  enters  on  the  new  quest  with 
its  motives  greatly  affected  by  the  primal 
beliefs.  It  is  a  very  remarkable  fact  that 
while  the  theologic  explanation  of  nature 
has  been  separately  invented,  or  at  least 
developed  from  a  very  primitive  notion  by 
many  different  peoples,  the  scientific  mo- 
tive is  essentially  peculiar  to  one  body  of 
folk,  the  Aryans,  and  has  attained  to  any 
considerable  development  in  only  one 


1 8      THE  APPRECIATION'  OF  NATURE. 

branch  of  that  race,  the  Greeks  and  their 
intellectual  descendants,  the  kindred  Eu- 
ropeans. The  essential  shape  of  our  mod- 
ern science  is  Greek.  We  have  inherited 
this  part  of  our  life  from  the  Hellenes 
even  more  immediately  than  we  have 
taken  the  basis  of  our  spiritual  motives 
from  the  Hebrew  race.  It  seems  quite 
probable  that  the  Greeks  in  their  early 
intellectual  history  derived  the  germs  of 
their  science  from  that  part  of  the  Aryan 
people  which  settled  in  India.  There  are 
indications  of  something  like  observational 
lore  among  these  people  of  Hindustan  in 
a  very  early  day  :  but  these  notions  as  to 
the  realm  of  nature  were  closely  bound 
up  with  the  body  of  religious  opinion,  and 
did  not  take  the  distinct  form  of  science. 
Such  as  they  were,  these  conceptions  of 
phenomena  were  a  part  of  the  cosmogony 
of  the  Hindoo  Aryans.  From  India  they 
seem  to  have  passed  to  the  land  of  the 
Nile,  and  thence  by  the  ancient  ways  of 
trade  to  the  Grecian  people.  Although 


THE  POLYTHEISTIC  CONCEPTION,      ig 

the  religious  conceptions  of  the  Greeks 
were  diversified,  they  in  general  sought  to 
account  for  the  phenomena  of  nature  by 
a  complicated  anthropomorphic  polythe- 
ism. Although  their  conceptions  are  not 
distinctly  formulated,  it  seems  clear  that 
every  orderly  occurrence  in  the  world  was 
usually  conceived,  at  least  in  the  ages  be- 
fore the  fourth  century  B.  c.,  as  explicable 
on  the  theory  that  it  was  brought  about 
through  the  will  of  a  being  who  in  essen- 
tial characteristics  was  like  man.  These 
beings  were  supposed  to  be  arrayed  in  a 
certain  hierarchal  subordination,  the  less 
powerful  under  the  greater,  and  thus  rank 
above  rank  until  the  supreme  was  at- 
tained. Certain  more  philosophical  minds 
conceived  the  divine  as  a  single  person- 
ality from  which  the  conception  of  human 
characteristics  was,  so  far  as  possible,  ex- 
cluded. Thus  Xenophanes  spoke  of  the 
control  as  being  in  the  hands  of 

"  One  god  among  all  gods  and  mankind  the  greatest ; 
Neither  in  body  like  unto  mortals,  nor  in  his  spirit" 


2O      THE  APPRECIA  TION  OF  NA  TURE. 

Good  as  is  this  conception,  it  is  not  at  all 
scientific,  but  purely  theological,  for  even 
Anaximander  appears  to  have  believed 
that  the  order  of  nature  was  in  the  control 
of  subordinated  intelligences  who  were  in 
some  way  dependent  upon  the  supreme. 

The  peculiar  task  before  the  Greeks, 
one  which  they  accomplished  in  a  marvel- 
ously  complete  manner,  was  that  of  fram- 
ing a  conception  as  to  the  way  in  which 
phenomena  were  controlled,  which  would 
exclude  the  idea  that  occurrences  were 
immediately  influenced  by  personal  divin- 
ities. The  precise  steps  of  the  process 
are  no  longer  traceable  in  detail,  or  at 
least  it  requires  more  scholarship  to  trace 
them  than  I  have  been  able  to  bring  to 
the  undertaking.  In  general  the  course 
of  thought  of  the  philosophers  who  led 
the  way  to  the  scientific  conception  of 
nature  appears  to  have  been  as  follows : 
Reflecting  on  the  hypothesis  of  polythe- 
istic control,  this  ancient  view  became 
repugnant  to  them ;  the  idea  that  the 


NATURAL  LAW.  -21 

majestic  harmonies  of  the  universe  were 
brought  about  by  the  efforts  of  a  throng 
of  exceedingly  human-like  beings  involved 
in  endless  discords,  such  as  the  mytholo- 
gies pictured,  was  naturally  offensive  to 
thoughtful  men.  For  a  long  time  no 
way  out  of  the  difficulty  was  found.  At 
length  a  hypothesis  was  invented  which 
by  a  gradual  series  of  transitions  led  to 
the  conception  of  natural  law.  We  find 
the  first  distinct  marks  of  this  invention 
in  the  writings  of  Plato.  It  is  contained 
in  his  doctrine  as  to  the  existence  of  uni- 
versals  in  the  same  sense  as  individuals 
exist ;  thus,  for  instance,  he  seems  to  have 
conceived  that  a  particular  species  of  tree 
existed  as  an  abstraction  from  the  eternal 
past,  the  actual  plant  itself  being  only  the 
physical  incarnation  of  the  eternal  form  ; 
the  individual  man  was  to  be  considered 
as  only  the  animated  expression  of  the 
equally  real  but  ever  enduring  idea  of 
humanity. 

In  a  certain  way  the  abstract  or  univer- 


22      THE  APPRECIATION  OF  NATURE. 

sal  idea  of  the  thing  thus  came  to  replace 
the  earlier  and  grosser  conception  of  the 
particular  human-like  God  who  shaped  the 
phenomena.  We  may  in  a  way  term  this 
universal  a  controlling  or  formative  power 
from  which  the  old  conception  of  all  baser 
qualities  has  been  taken  away.  The  Pla- 
tonic universal  immaterial  being,  which 
ever  seeks  to  shape  itself  in  matter,  seems 
to  me  to  be  essentially  the  ancient  god 
from  which  the  philosopher  has  excluded 
all  irrelevant  qualities.  The  shaping  power 
still  remains  a  distinct  creature,  inces- 
santly seeking  expression  in  reality ;  it  is 
in  a  sense  the  ghost  of  the  old  deity  or 
demigod. 

When  the  abstract  conception  involved 
in  the  Platonic  theory  of  natural  order 
had  been  formed,  the  next  step  toward 
what  we  term  the  scientific  idea  was 
quickly  attained.  We  find  it  in  the  writ- 
ings of  Aristotle  developed  in  nearly  the 
same  degree  of  elevation  which  it  exhibits 
in  our  own  day.  The  Stagyrite  advances 


ARISTOTL&S  METHOD.  23 

the  eonception  by  still  further  withdrawing 
from  the  mental  picture  of  the  causes 
which  lead  to  phenomena,  all  the  qualities 
of  personality.  With  him  the  category  or 
framework  takes  the  place  of  the  uni- 
versal. Things  are  by  him  conceived  as 
shaped  by  some  power  acting  behind  the 
genus  or  species  into  which  they  fall,  but 
he  invented,  or  at  least  affirmed,  the  cus- 
tom of  leaving  the  mode  of  action  of  this 
causation  quite  without  consideration,  at 
least  while  he  was  dealing  with  the  mat- 
ter in  a  scientific  way.  With  Aristotle, 
the  category  thus  became  a  mere  alge- 
braic expression  for  control  in  nature ;  he 
used  it  as  a  mathematician  uses  the  sign 
for  infinity  without  pretense  of  explana- 
tion; with  this  recognition  of  the  essen- 
tial unknowableness  of  ultimate  causes, 
science  in  its  strict,  we  may  say  indeed  in 
its  Aryan,  sense  begins.  We  thus  see,  a? 
far  at  least  as  the  fragmentary  condition 
of  the  records  of  Greek  learning  permits, 
that  the  manner  of  explaining  nature 


24     THE  APPRECIATION  OF  NATURE. 

which  is  characteristic  of  science  grew  by 
rapid  and  tolerably  clearly  indicated  pas- 
sages of  thought  from  the  polytheistic 
method  of  accounting  for  the  order  of 
nature.  Although  there  are  many  indica- 
tions that  the  Greeks  of  times  earlier  than 
Aristotle  were  more  or  less  affected  by 
similar  views  as  to  the  way  in  which  the 
universe  was  controlled,  it  was  in  the 
century  of  the  Stagyrite  and  his  great 
master  that  the  separation  between  cos- 
mology, which  seeks  to  account  for  all 
phenomena  on  the  theistic  hypothesis,  and 
science,  which  professes  and  declares  the 
ignorance  which  the  observer  finds  to 
limit  his  inquiries,  was  accomplished.  Al- 
though, as  we  shall  have  hereafter  to  note, 
science  has  made  certain  advances  in  the 
ways  which  were  first  clearly  entered  on 
by  the  Greeks,  the  essential  direction  of 
all  its  subsequent  course  was  fixed  by 
them. 

The  immense  advantage  which   is  af- 
forded by  the  Aristotelian  limitations  to 


ARISTOTLE'S  ACHIEVEMENT.         2$ 

inquiry  is  admirably  shown  in  the  vast 
,  results  which  the  method  attained  in  the 
hands  of  its  inventor  and  first  master. 
As  long  as  men  sought  and  seemed  to 
find  an  account  of  all  things  in  the  imag- 
ined motives  of  human-like  but  undiscern- 
ible  individuals  who  by  their  power  con- 
trolled all  happenings  of  the  universe,  it 
was  impossible  to  set  about  the  task  of 
explaining  phenomena  in  the  physical, 
organic,  or  social  world  in  a  rational  way. 
When,  however,  the  conception  of  natural 
law  began  to  form,  a  wide  and  tempting 
path  was  opened  to  a  new  kind  of  intellect- 
ual endeavor,  in  which  men  explained  oc- 
currences by  the  orderly  features  which 
facts  presented  on  their  face.  It  seems 
to  me  that  the  enormous  work  accom- 
plished by  Aristotle,  which,  taken  as  a 
whole  and  under  the  conditions  in  which 
it  was  done,  must  be  esteemed  as  the 
greatest  body  of  labor  ever  performed  by 
a  man,  was  due  in  part  at  least  to  the  fact 
that  he  was  the  first  clearly  to  see  that  the 


26     THE  APPRECIATION  OF  NATURE. 

thing  should  be  interpreted  by  itself  and 
its  relation  to  other  visible  things.  Or,  in 
other  words,  to  the  newly  awakened  sense 
that  phenomena  afforded,  if  not  all  that 
was  necessary  for  their  explanation,  at 
least  all  that  could  be  utilized  by  human 
skill.  Inspired  by  this  view,  which  seems 
to  our  eyes  so  commonplace,  but  /  was  in 
his  day  an  inspiration,  that  brilliant  and 
penetrating  mind  made  haste  to  assemble 
the  unorganized  mass  of  Greek  learning 
in  clear  and  categoric  form.  His  concep- 
tion as  to  the  meaning  of  natural  order, 
and  the  limits  which  inquiry  into  it  may 
put  upon  his  work,  enabled  him  to  put  the 
chaos  of  ancient  acquisition  into  shape 
with  a  speed  which  has  had  no  parallel  in 
other  ages.  I  am  tempted  to  compare 
Darwin's  work  with  that  of  Aristotle,  but 
the  British  philosopher  was  limited  to  the 
narrow  field  of  the  biological  sciences, 
while  the  great  peripatetic  marched  as  a 
conqueror  through  all  the  domain  of  the 
phenomenal  world,  and  at  his  death  in  his 


GREEK  SCIENCE.  2? 

sixty-third  year  had  founded  science  for 
all  time. 

The  foundations  laid  by  the  school  of 
Aristotle  waited  long  before  any  consider- 
able structure  was  built  upon  them.  We 
can  see  some  effect  of  his  positivist  view 
in  the  later  states  of  Greek  science.  It  is 
particularly  manifested  in  the  writings  of 
Strabo.  But  many  of  the  Greeks  who 
sought  to  explain  nature,  even  where  they 
neglected  the  polytheistic  notions,  re- 
mained subject  to  the  speculative  humor 
characteristic  of  the  Hellenes,  and  this  led 
them,  in  the  manner  of  Lucretius,  who, 
though  by  birth  a  Roman,  was  in  spirit 
and  training  a  Greek,  to  invent  purely 
speculative  hypotheses  to  account  for  the 
facts  of  nature.  They  were  unscientific  in 
that  they  did  not  search  the  phenomena 
for  the  explanation  they  sought,  but 
evolved  it  from  their  minds.  The  Ro- 
mans, who  so  greedily  appropriated,  as  far 
as  their  nature  would  permit,  the  culture 
of  the  Greeks,  and  who  were  successful 


28      THE  APPRECIATION  OF  NATURE. 

in  acquiring  a  tincture  of  their  literary 
and  philosophical  spirit,  as  well  as  their 
motives  in  the  plastic  art,  utterly  failed  to 
gain  any  share  of  the  Hellenic  spirit  in 
scientific  inquiry.  In  the  centuries  of 
intellectual  history  after  the  fall  of  Greece, 
the  Romans  developed  no  inquirer  fit  to 
be  compared  with  scores  of  men  who  be- 
longed in  the  earlier  civilization.  Pliny 
the  elder  was  exceedingly  curious  in  all  that 
related  to  the  natural  world,  but  his  works 
show  that  he  never  had  the  faintest  idea 
of  science.  He  knew  about  as  much  of 
its  spirit  as  does  the  moth  when  it  meets 
its  fate  in  the  candle.  Nature  attracted 
him  even  to  his  death  in  the  Vesuvian 
eruption,  but  it  was  mere  primitive  curios- 
ity that  impelled  him  to  his  tireless  indus- 
try in  gathering  facts. 

It  is  important  for  students  of  science 
to  note  this  striking,  indeed  we  may  say 
amazing,  contrast  between  the  scientific 
spirit  of  the  Greeks  and  that  of  the  Ro- 
mans;  it  serves  to  give  us  many  impor- 


ROMAN  SCIENCE.  2Q 

tant  lessons ;  it  tells  us  how  peculiar  and 
exceptional  is  that  organization  of  mind 
which  permits  the  development  of  the 
scientific  spirit.  The  Romans  had  a 
genius  for  many  of  the  higher  walks  of 
thought  and  action.  The  difficult  princi- 
ples of  jurisprudence  first  took  clear  and 
logical  shape  in  their  hands  ;  they  were  of 
all  the  ancients  the  most  skillful  in  mas- 
tering the  conditions  of  nature  and  in 
turning  them  to  the  immediate  uses  of 
man.  They  had  the  historic  sense  as  well 
developed  as  the  Greeks,  and  in  all  mat- 
ters of  government,  particularly  in  the 
work  of  administration,  they  were  the 
superiors  of  the  Hellenes.  When,  how- 
ever, we  come  to  science  we  find  that 
they  not  only  had  no  power  to  invent  ex- 
planations after  the  manner  of  the  Greeks, 
but  they  possessed  so  little  intelligent 
curiosity  that  they  could  not  make  use  of 
what  came  to  them  from  that  people.  It 
would  be  interesting  to  note  this  contrast 
in  more  detail,  but  for  the  present  we 


30     THE  APPRECIATION  OF  NATURE. 

are  concerned  with  another  aspect  of 
the  matter,  namely,  as  to  the  effect  of 
Roman  dominancy  on  the  history  of  the 
methods  of  explaining  nature. 

The  singular  contrast  between  the  atti- 
tude of  the  Greek  and  Roman  people  in 
all  which  relates  to  the  interpretation  of 
nature,  long  ago  led  me  to  question  the 
race  kinship  of  those  peoples.  Until  re- 
cently this  doubt  appeared  futile,  for  the 
reason  that  historians  and  archaeologists 
appeared  to  be  substantially  agreed  in 
holding  to  the  idea  of  their  close  affinity. 
It  is  interesting  to  note  that  at  the  pre- 
sent time  students  who  are  well  informed 
seem  inclined  to  believe  that  the  Etrus- 
cans came  to  central  Italy  from  northern 
Africa,  and  that  they  are  possibly  to  be 
classed  as  people  of  Semitic  affinities. 
If  this  view  be  correct,  it  may  turn  out 
that  a  large  share  of  the  Roman  blood  and 
of  the  inherited  motives  which  go  there- 
with is  not  of  Aryan  origin,  and  that 
many  elements  in  the  history  of  Europe 


THE  DARK  AGES.  31 

which  are  due  to  the  influence  of  Rome 
may  be  accounted  for  by  the  supposition 
that  the  Latin  impulses  were  founded  on 
the  character  of  a  non-Aryan  people. 

It  was  a  momentous  event  in  the  his- 
tory of  learning  when  Christianity  passed 
to  the  people  of  western  Europe  through 
the  gates  of  Rome,  for  it  thereby  came 
into  the  keeping  of  a  people  who  were 
incapable  of  sympathy  with  the  spirit  of 
scientific  inquiry.  The  result  was  that 
for  a  thousand  years  or  more  all  trace  of 
the  broad  catholic  spirit  which  found  its 
summit  in  Aristotle  failed  to  find  a  place 
among  the  Latin  and  Gothic  peoples.  It 
is  often  assumed  that  the  lack  of  the  mo- 
tive of  inquiry  in  these  centuries  was  due 
to  the  deliberate  exercise  of  priestly  au- 
thority in  its  repression.  The  truth  is, 
that  the  spirit  of  the  naturalist  did  not 
exist  among  the  Romans  any  more  than  it 
did  among  the  Hebrew  people.  In  fact, 
the  intellectual  motives  of  the  race  who 
gave  us  Christianity  and  of  the  nation 


32     THE  APPRECIATION  OF  NATURE. 

which  again  propagated  it  in  Europe  are 
in  many  ways  akin.  This  spirit  in  both 
peoples  permits  the  nurture  of  a  pro- 
foundly theistic  explanation  of  the  uni- 
verse, but  it  has  no  room  for  the  peculiar 
views  of  science.  Hence  while  certain 
parts  of  Aristotle's  works  were  almost 
adopted  by  the  Church  as  sacred  books, 
we  find  no  evidence  of  effect  arising  from 
his  inquiring  motive  until  relatively  mod- 
ern times.  All  the  parts  of  his  writings 
which  we  may  term  naturalistic  were 
essentially  incomprehensible  to  those  who 
had  no  tincture  of  the  Greek  spirit.  We 
therefore  do  not  have  to  look  to  the  some- 
what natural  antagonism  between  the 
theistic  and  scientific  explanations  of  the 
phenomenal  world  for  the  destruction  or 
suppression  of  the  Hellenic  motive  of 
inquiry.  It  is  in  the  main  sufficiently 
accounted  for  by  the  lack  of  all  interest  in 
or  understanding  of  such  matters  among 
the  people  who  had  to  support  the  struc- 
ture of  the  Church. 


THE  REVIVAL   OF  SCIENCE.  33 

It  should,  moreover,  be  noted  that  the 
death  of  Greek  science  was  as  complete, 
though  it  came  about  in  a  less  rapid  man- 
ner among  the  descendants  of  the  Hel- 
lenes in  eastern  Europe  than  in  the  west- 
ern world.  In  the  Byzantine  empire  the 
spirit  of  interpretation  was  buried  beneath 
trashy  word-spinnings,  and  was  lost  in  all 
save  the  imperfect  manuscript  records. 
The  fact  is  apparent  that  Hellenic  science 
was  a  frail  and  temporary  flower  of  that 
marvelous  culture  which  blossomed  in 
Athens  in  the  fourth  century  B.  c.  We 
may  well  doubt  whether  it  would  have 
given  fruitful  seed  and  come  to  possess 
the  earth,  even  if  Greece  had  remained 
unsubjugated,  and  the  Christian  religion 
had  not,  by  giving  new  life  to  the  theistic 
explanation  of  this  world,  turned  men's 
minds  from  this  inquiry. 

The  revival  of  scientific  explanation  in 
the  latter  part  of  the  Middle  Ages  affords 
a  much  more  puzzling  series  of  facts  than 
does  its  origin  in  the  Hellenic  time.  The 


34     THE  APPRECIATION  OF  NATURE. 

original  invention  of  the  method  we  can 
trace  back  to  a  particular  age  and  place 
when  a  small  body  of  cultivated  people 
contrived  the  way  of  thinking.  The  revi- 
val took  place  almost  simultaneously  in 
several  widely  separated  countries.  The 
renaissance  of  learning  occurred  sepa- 
rately and  at  about  the  same  time  in  Italy, 
in  Germany,  and  in  Britain.  It  is  difficult 
to  say  in  what  degree  it  is  to  be  attributed 
to  the  influence  of  the  Greek  learning  in 
general,  which  was  widely  disseminated 
after  the  fall  of  Constantinople,  and  how 
far  it  was  due  to  the  better  understanding 
of  Aristotle.  Rarely  is  the  student  able 
to  tell  us  whence  he  derived  his  motives. 
Yet  more  rarely  does  he  take  pains  to 
analyze  the  history  of  his  intellectual  mo- 
tives and  record  them  for  history's  sake. 
It  is,  however,  clear  that  whether  it  was 
the  study  of  Greek  science  which  aroused 
our  western  learning  to  life  or  no,  the 
shape  it  took  was  determined  by  the  Hel- 
lenic writings,  mainly  by  those  of  Aris- 


ARISTOTL&S   WRITINGS.  35 

totle.  He  was  the  one  man  of  science 
whose  works  were  patronized  by  the 
Church.  His  works  were  more  widely 
disseminated  than  those  of  any  other 
philosopher,  and  have  provided  a  founda- 
tion for  thought  in  all  the  more  important 
branches  of  science. 

The  portion  of  Aristotle's  writings 
which  the  Church  most  favored  was,  it  is 
true,  not  that  which  treats  of  natural 
science.  This  part  of  his  contributions 
long  remained  inaccessible  in  the  original 
language,  while  the  more  purely  philosoph- 
ical treatises  became  common  property 
in  the  Latin  translations.  Nevertheless, 
there  were  Greek  scholars  enough  for  the 
need,  and  the  principles  of  the  Aristo- 
telian system  which  penetrated  all  his 
works  imbued  the  minds  of  men  with  the 
scientific  spirit.  Even  a  cursory  glance 
at  the  influence  of  Aristotle  on  mediaeval 
learning  will  convince  the  student  that 
this  philosopher's  position  was  such  that 
no  scholar  who  understood  him  could 


36     THE  APPRECIATION  OF  NATURE. 

escape  from  his  control.  His  influence 
was  then  more  pervading  in  all  branches 
of  learning  than  that  of  Darwin  now  is  in 
the  particular  field  of  biology.  For  my 
part  I  am  convinced  that  while  the  ten- 
dency towards  inquiry  which  led  to  mod- 
ern science  was  indigenous  and  marks  a 
stage  of  intellectual  development,  as  it  did 
in  Greece,  the  organization  of  that  motive 
is  due  to  Hellenic  science  quite  as  much 
as  that  of  our  religion  is  attributable  to 
the  motives  which  arose  in  certain  Asiatic 
peoples. 

Although  modern  science  has  in  its 
essential  features  departed  but  little  from 
the  main  lines  indicated  by  Aristotle,  and 
this  because  his  position  was  in  its  nature 
final,  there  have  been  noteworthy  changes 
in  certain  practical  and  theoretical  fea- 
tures which  have  very  gradually  effected 
the  conduct  and  success  of  this  method  of 
inquiry.  We  have  learned  a  simple  lesson 
which  the  Greeks  never  knew,  which  is  in 
effect  that  it  is  necessary  to  verify  opin- 


THE  NEED   OF  CRITICISM.  37 

ions  so  far  as  is  possible  by  experiment,  and 
where  that  cannot  be  effected,  by  repeat- 
edly comparing  the  occurrences  with  the 
hypothesis  by  which  we  seek  to  explain 
them.  For  lack  of  this  system  of  verifica- 
tion, the  Greeks,  even  Aristotle  himself, 
were  often  beguiled  by  mere  speculations, 
where  the  tyro  in  modern  inquiry  would 
have  found  his  way  to  the  substantial 
truth.  It  required  many  generations  of 
modern  science  to  make  this  need  of  criti- 
cism and  revision  clear,  and  to  this  day  it 
remains  the  weakest  side  of  most  scientific 
work. 

The  modern  conception  as  to  the  mode 
of  action  of  energy  has  perhaps  also  served 
in  a  measure  to  change  the  state  of  mind 
of  naturalists  with  reference  to  the  true 
position  of  phenomena  in  the  universe. 
We  probably  see  the  curious  succession  of 
events  in  their  lines  of  dependence  and 
interdependence  in  a  clearer  manner  than 
the  abler  Greeks  of  the  peripatetic  school, 
but  these  are  differences  of  so  minor  a 


38      THE  APPRECIATION  OF  NATURE. 

kind  that  the  naturalists  or  physicists  of 
to-day,  apart  from  the  language,  would 
find  hardly  more  difficulty  in  exchanging 
ideas  with  Aristotle  than  they  would  en- 
counter with  educated  men  of  their  own 
time  and  country. 

One  of  the  most  essential  peculiarities 
of  modern  science,  as  compared  with  the 
Hellenic  system,  is  the  range  of  the  motive 
in  this  age.  In  the  days  of  Aristotle  this 
branch  of  inquiry  commanded  the  sympa- 
thies of  only  a  small  part  of  the  societies 
in  which  it  was  nurtured.  It  remained 
the  possession  of  the  limited  class  of  in- 
tellectual people ;  it  did  not  sensibly  affect 
the  conduct  of  life,  either  in  practical 
affairs  or  in  the  field  of  morals ;  it  never 
became,  as  in  modern  times,  the  agent  by 
which  the  faculty  of  mechanical  invention 
has  been  quickened.  Its  only  conquests 
were  in  the  minds  of  men.  It  did  not 
extend  beyond  the  limits  of  the  Hellenic 
civilization  until  some  centuries  after  that 
civilization  fell  to  pieces.  Then  in  the 


SCIENCE  AMONG   THE  SARACENS.     39 

seventh  century  of  our  era  some  of  the 
seed  which  fell  upon  what  would  have 
seemed  at  first  sight  hopelessly  stony 
ground,  among  the  Arabian  Moslems, 
quickened  into  a  brief  but  vigorous  life. 
I  cannot  here  trace  the  unique  excursion 
of  the  scientific  motive  beyond  the  limits 
of  the  Aryan  folk.  It  is  in  many  ways, 
however,  the  most  singular  and  interesting 
incident  in  the  history  of  learning.  For 
our  purpose  we  need  only  to  note  the  fact 
that  the  Saracens  eagerly  sought  for  the 
scientific  works  of  the  Greeks.  They  made 
effective  use  of  all  of  their  more  practical 
parts ;  for  two  centuries  they  cultivated 
the  sciences  of  mathematics,  chemistry, 
and  astronomy,  and,  perhaps,  advanced , 
them  somewhat  beyond  the  stage  in 
which  they  were  left  by  the  Hellenes,  and 
then,  in  an  inexplicable  way,  abandoned 
the  field. 

Except  for  the  above-mentioned  brief 
culture  of  natural  science  by  the  Ara- 
bians, we  have  no  evidence  that  its  mo- 


4O     THE  APPRECIATION  OF  NATURE. 

tives  have  ever  been  appreciated  by  any 
other  people  than  the  Aryans.  Even 
among  the  Saracens,  although  some  of  its 
votaries  appear  to  have  been  of  a  natural- 
istic turn  of  mind,  this  branch  of  learning 
seems  to  have  been  used  as  a  toy  or  a 
convenient  tool,  and  was  not  to  any  ex- 
tent sought  as  a  means  of  exploring  the 
world  of  phenomena.  This  exceptional 
extension  of  science  seems  rather  to  ac- 
cent than  to  invalidate  the  general  truth 
that  the  scientific  interpretation  of  nature 
is  a  task  for  which  as  yet  only  the  Aryan 
people  are  truly  and  instinctively  fitted, 
and  even  in  this  race  there  are  folk  such 
as  the  Romans  who  have  no  innate  ten- 
dencies towards  this  form  of  thought. 
Similar  limitations  in  the  intellectual 
powers  of  diverse  peoples  are  shown  in 
other  fields  than  that  of  science.  The 
Aryan  folk,  notwithstanding  their  singular 
capacities,  have  to  thank  another  race  for 
their  religion.  A  pure  monotheism  based 
upon  an  exalted  conception  of  the  duty 


THE    TASK  OF  THE  ARYANS.          41 

owed  by  the  individual  to  the  Supreme 
Being  did  not,  so  far  as  the  history  of  our 
race  goes,  seem  to  lie  in  the  trend  of  their 
thought.  While  individual  men  attained 
to  it  they  were  unable  to  give  it  the  inten- 
sity necessary  for  dominance.  The  genius 
of  our  western  nations  appears  to  lead  its 
people  towards  the  consideration  of  the 
phenomenal  world.  It  secures  ever  emi- 
nent success  in  the  task  of  dealing  with 
the  immediate  and  tangible  realm.  It  is 
doubtful  if  the  sense  of  the  unseen  which 
leads  to  moral  and  religious  conceptions 
was  as  strong  in  our  ancestors  as  it  clearly 
was  among  certain  other  peoples,  partic- 
ularly the  Hebrews. 

It  would  be  an  interesting  matter  to 
consider  what  shape  the  interpretation 
of  nature  would  have  taken  among  the 
Aryans  of  modern  Europe,  if  they  had 
lacked  the  inspiration  which  came  from 
the  revival  of  Greek  learning.  There  are 
not  wanting  indications  that  the  motives 
which  lead  to  this  interpretation  would 


42      THE  APPRECIATION  OF  NATURE. 

have  created  a  new  something  like  the 
methods  of  inquiry  which  were  invented 
by  the  Greeks,  and  that  modern  Europe, 
even  if  it  had  lacked  Hellenic  traditions, 
would,  though  doubtless  more  slowly,  have 
found  its  way  to  the  existing  methods  of 
interpretation. 

In  summing  up  these  considerations,  we 
may  say  that  the  appreciation  of  phenom- 
ena among  all  men  seems  to  begin  with  the 
assumption  that  their  order  is  determined 
by  the  action  of  beings  essentially  like 
men  or  animals.  A  polytheism  commonly 
anthropomorphic  appears  to  be  the  uni- 
versal and  apparently  inevitable  first  step 
in  this  process  of  accounting  for  events. 
With  the  enlargement  of  these  primitive 
conceptions  they  become  more  rationalized ; 
the  order  of  nature  is  gradually  conceived 
as  due  to  the  influence  of  more  and  more 
powerful  unseen  agents,  until  finally  the 
monotheistic  conception  is  more  or  less 
perfectly  attained.  This  final  majestic 
picture  of  universal  control  appears  to 


UNIVERSAL  CONTROL.  43 

have  originated  in  several  different  places. 
It  seems  to  be  a  natural  outgrowth  from 
polytheism.  It  is  true  that  these  mono- 
theistic views  do  not  exclude,  in  fact  they 
may  be  said  always  to  include,  the  exist- 
ence of  subordinate  divinities  who  are 
more  or  less  completely  conceived  as  the 
servants  of  the  supreme  power.  Nor  in 
an  imperfect  way  is  this  idea  of  a  central 
and  supreme  power  made  to  account  for 
the  phenomenal  side  of  the  world.  It  is 
rather  directed  towards  the  moral  relations 
of  man. 

With  the  further  development  of  cul- 
ture there  arises  an  intenser  curiosity 
concerning  the  processes  of  nature.  In 
the  highest  state  of  Grecian  culture,  when 
men  by  a  very  perfect  training  in  the  fine 
arts  had  their  minds  quickened  to  the 
utmost,  they  eagerly  demanded  some  ex- 
planation as  to  the  prevailing  order  of  the 
organic  and  the  physical  world.  They 
were  not  satisfied  with  the  account  which 
was  presented  by  the  religious  system  of 


44       THE  APPRECIATION'  OF  NATURE. 

their  age,  and  so  they  gradually  found 
their  way  to  the  conception  of  natural 
law.  Again,  in  the  Renaissance,  once 
more  quickened  by  the  sense  of  natural 
harmony  through  the  arts  of  painting, 
sculpture,  and  poetry,  men  instinctively 
sought  a  rational  account  of  the  world 
which  their  religious  traditions  did  not 
offer  them.  In  this  time  they  had  the 
good  help  which  came  from  the  remnants 
of  Hellenic  science,  and  so  were  hastened 
on  the  way  which  they  would  probably 
have  achieved,  though  with  greater  diffi- 
culty, if  they  had  been  left  altogether  to 
their  own  resources/  For  a  while  and  most 
naturally  the  Church  contended  against 
the  new  method  of  interpreting  nature. 
It  would  have  been  indeed  false  to  its  duty 
if  it  had  not  opposed  the  ways  of  science. 
It  was  morally  bound  to  uphold  the  con- 
viction that  the  old  method  of  accounting 
for  the  course  of  events  by  the  supernatu- 
ral hypothesis  was  true  and  sufficient. 
Omar's  conclusion  that  the  books  which 


SCIENCE  AND   THE  CHURCH.  45 

contained  the  truths  of  the  Koran  were 
superfluous,  and  all  which  gainsaid  them 
mischievous,  is  the  logical  outcome  of 
reason  as  exercised  by  the  thorough-going 
supernaturalist. 

The  clearest  outcome  of  the  debate  be- 
tween the  extreme  supernatural ists  and 
the  naturalists  is  that  science  still  lives 
and  has  won  a  curiously  strong  place 
among  men.  There  is,  however,  a  less 
evident,  but,  to  the  thoughtful  student, 
larger  view  of  this  interaction.  This,  as 
it  appears  to  me,  I  shall  now  endeavor 
briefly  to  set  forth. 

As  long  as  natural  science  dealt  with 
the  immediate  aspects  of  simple  phenom- 
ena, the  measure  of  explanation  which  was 
demanded  was  small.  It  was  necessary 
only  to  suppose  the  existence  of  actions 
of  causation  as  simple  as  those  with  which 
our  own  voluntary  deeds  make  us  familiar. 
That  necessary  kind  of  sequence  of  phe- 
nomena which  we  term  "cause  and  ef- 
fect" appears  at  first  sight  very  simple, 


46      THE  APPRECIATION  OF  NATURE. 

because  it  is  so  like  in  results  to  our  indi- 
vidual actions,  and  thus  the  first  stage  of 
natural  inquiry  led  men  of  science  to  the 
curious  and  undeclared  assumption  that 
the  visible  was  the  essential  part  of  the 
universe.  As  inquiries  have  gone  deeper 
into  the  realm  of  causation,  especially  as 
the  conditions  of  organic  life  have  been 
made  the  subject  of  more  penetrating 
study,  the  sense  of  the  profundity  of  nat- 
ural law  has  been  continually  enhanced. 
In  the  study  of  the  successions  exhibited 
by  animals  and  plants  it  has  been  per- 
ceived that  the  march  of  events  from  the 
primitive  simplicity  towards  greater  and 
greater  complication,  culminating  in  man, 
requires  us  to  assume  the  existence  of 
something  like  permanent  guiding  influ- 
ences operating  in  the  world  of  matter. 
As  the  conception  of  these  and  of  other 
laws  or  principles  operating  in  nature  be- 
comes more  complicated,  naturalists  are 
being  driven  step  by  step  to  hypothecate 
the  presence  in  the  universe  of  conditions 


THE   TREND   OF  MODERN  SCIENCE.  47 

which  are  best  explained  by  the  supposi- 
tion that  the  direction  of  affairs  is  in  the 
control  of  something  like  our  own  intelli- 
gence. As  yet  this  thought  is  vague,  but 
whoever  will  inform  himself  as  to  the 
trend  of  modern  science  will  see  that  even 
where  the  votaries  of  the  new  learning  are 
most  indisposed  to  recognize  the  increas- 
ing measure  of  their  theistic  motives,  the 
increase  is  nevertheless  discernible.  I 
am  myself  convinced  that  in  the  next  cen- 
tury there  will  be  a  state  of  science  in 
which  the  unknown  will  be  conceived  as 
peopled  with  powers  whose  existence  is 
justly  and  necessarily  inferred  from  the 
knowledge  which  has  been  obtained  from 
their  manifestations.  In  other  words,  it 
seems  to  me  that  the  naturalist  is  most 
likely  to  approach  the  position  of  the  phil- 
osophical theologian  by  paths  which  at 
first  seemed  to  lie  far  apart  from  his  do- 
main. 

On  the  other  hand,  the  theological  con- 
ceptions, though  in  their  nature  rigid,  are 


48       THE  APPRECIATION  OF  NATURE. 

yielding  much  to  the  influence  of  scien- 
tific or  phenomenal  truth.  They  have  al- 
ready been  greatly  affected  by  the  concep- 
tions of  physical  law  operating  in  material 
things.  Theologians  have  in  good  part 
abandoned  the  old  contention  that  the 
course  of  events  was  controlled  by  an  ar- 
bitrary and  variable  divine  will.  They  are 
now  generally  content  to  abandon  the  in- 
terpretation of  the  phenomenal  world  to 
the  naturalists,  confining  their  thought 
within  their  true  and  unassailable  strong- 
hold, the  moral  kingdom. 

The  issue  of  this  great  discussion  is  as 
yet  not  clearly  foretellable,  but  enough  of 
it  can  be  determined  to  lead  us  to  the 
conviction  that  the  two  methods  of  inter- 
preting nature  which  were  originally 
united,  then  long  separated,  are  again  to 
be  conjoined.  The  primary  condition  of 
this  union  will  be  the  abandonment  of  the 
existing  conception  that  there  are  two  dis- 
tinct realms  accessible  to  man,  the  natural 
and  the  supernatural,  and  the  replace- 


TRUE  IDEA    OF  THE    UNIVERSE.         49 

ment  of  this  view  by  the  idea  that  the 
universe  is  one  great  field  through  which 
the  spirit  of  man  is  to  range  with  ever- 
increasing  freedom. 


CHAPTER   II. 

CRITICAL    POINTS    IN    THE    CONTINUITY    OF 
NATURAL    PHENOMENA. 

'  THE  greatest  contribution  of  modern 
science  to  human  thought  is  doubtless  to 
be  found  in  the  idea  of  the  continuity  of 
causation  which  it  has  brought  home  to 
the  minds  of  all  educated  people.  The 
ancients,  it  is  true,  speculated  on  this  pos- 
sible orderly  succession  of  events ;  but  it 
has  been  the  peculiar  fortune  of  our  own 
century  to  trace  step  by  step  the  links  of 
the  great  chains  of  order  until  the  uni- 
versal bond  which  unites  all  actions  has 
been  made  clear.  Our  present  concep- 
tion of  nature  is  perhaps  no  more  imbued 
with  the  idea  of  continuity  than  that  set 
forth  by  Lucretius,  or  by  the  earlier  Greek 
philosophers  from  whom  he  derived  his 
ideas ;  but,  unlike  these  ancient  specula- 


THE   CONSERVATION  OF  ENERGY.        51 

tions,  our  modern  opinion  is  founded  on 
knowledge  and  is  affirmed  by  experiment. 
The  doctrine  of  the  conservation  of  en- 
ergy was  obscurely  set  forth  by  the  Py- 
thagoreans in  the  sixth  century  before 
Christ,  but  until  within  a  hundred  years  it 
was  a  mere  speculation.  It  now  rests 
upon  as  firm  ground  as  the  theory  of 
gravitation.  By  the  experiments  which 
affirm  it  our  conceptions  of  the  physical 
universe  are  unified  as  they  never  were 
in  the  earlier  history  of  natural  science. 
Seen  through  the  light  which  this  far- 
reaching  law  throws  upon  the  physical 
world,  we  conceive  all  the  material  uni- 
verse to  be  moving  onward  from  stage  to 
stage  of  being,  its  primal  store  of  force 
unchanged ;  its  matter  passing  from  one 
form  to  another,  but  the  quantities  of  the 
force  and  matter  remaining  as  they  were 
in  the  remotest  age  of  which  the  imagina- 
tion can  form  a  picture.  Thus  the  mod- 
ern philosophical  conception  of  the  world 
excludes  the  possibility  of  accidents.  The 


52  CRITICAL  POINTS. 

orderly  succession  of  events  apparently 
demands  the  belief  that  the  transitions 
from  one  stage  of  action  to  another  shall 
not  be  sudden.  It  appears  to  exclude 
revolution  and  to  give  the  continuity  of  a 
stream  to  the  movement  of  causation  on 
its  way  from  the  infinite  past  to  the  infi- 
nite future. 

My  object  in  this  essay  is  in  a  brief 
way  to  examine  the  validity  of  our  present 
conception  which  assumes  the  entire  con- 
tinuity of  the  universe ;  to  see  how  far 
our  observations  may  serve  to  qualify  a 
certain  assumption  which  has  entered  into 
our  thought,  and  which  leads  us  almost 
insensibly  to  conclude  that  because  every 
condition  of  the  physical  world  is  abso- 
lutely the  product  of  actions  which  have 
gone  before,  we  can  therefore  assume  no 
room  for  sudden  changes  in  the  course  of 
events. 

Accepting,  as  we  must,  the  idea  that 
every  cause  is  the  source  of  effect,  and 
every  effect  the  result  of  causation,  we 


THE   UNEXPECTED.  53 

• 

shall  try  to  see  what  room  this  leaves  for 
the  occurrence  of  the  unexpected  in  the 
phenomenal  realm.  I  cannot  too  strongly 
affirm  that  my  intention  is  not  in  any  way 
to  contend  against  the  doctrine  of  con- 
tinuity of  action  in  nature.  I  shall  seek 
only  to  modify  this  conception,  and  to 
show  that  there  is  an  element  of  unexpect- 
edness in  the  operation  of  natural  causes. 
In  this  effort  I  shall  first  consider  certain 
phenomena  of  the  physical  world,  and 
then  a  group  of  actions  which  we  find  dis- 
played in  the  organic  realm. 

We  readily  note  the  primal  fact  that 
the  visible  universe  as  far  as  regards  its 
component  elements,  those  apparently  ul- 
timate individualities  in  the  structure  of 
matter,  is  extremely  discontinuous  and,  so 
to  speak,  fragmentary.  There  are  some 
scores  of  these  elements,  each  apparently 
endowed  with  primal  characteristics  differ- 
ing from  one  another  in  an  absolute  way. 
Though  it  is  possible  and,  indeed,  prob- 
able that  some  of  them  may  be  decom- 


54  CRITICAL  POINTS. 

posed  at  high  temperatures  such  as  pre- 
vail in  the  sun,  there  is  no  reason  to  be- 
lieve that  as  a  whole  there  exists,  or  ever 
has  existed,  an  elemental  uniformity  in  the 
universe.  The  visible  realm  of  nature  as 
we  know  it  is  composed  of  a  battalion  of 
individualities,  the  separate  forms  of  mat- 
ter. Each  of  these  primal  forms  exists 
separately  and  has  its  individual  charac- 
teristics ;  it  acts  in  a  certain  limited  coop- 
eration with  the  other  elements.  When 
apart  from  these  combinations  it  appears 
to  have  an  absolutely  independent  life. 

When  these  separate  elements  enter 
into  combination,  the  result  of  their  as- 
sociation has  an  unpredictable  quality. 
Given  a  knowledge  of  .the  properties  be- 
longing to  two  or  more  separate  elements, 
it  is  impossible  to  say  in  the  present  state 
of  our  knowledge  what  will  be  the  result 
of  their  association  in  this  or  that  of  the 
many  numerical  relations  which  they  may 
assume.  Each  of  these  almost  infinitely 
varying  phenomena  of  association  appar- 


NOVEL  INFLUENCES.  55 

ently  institutes  a  new  condition  in  the 
world  of  matter.  Whenever  two  elements 
or  molecules  enter  a  combination  not  be- 
fore attained,  novel  and  often  startling 
influences  are  introduced  into  the  physical 
world.  It  is  true  that  the  primal  force 
and  matter  are  not  changed  in  quantity; 
but  the  mode  of  action,  the  effect  of  these 
original  entities,  may  be  very  greatly  al- 
tered. If  we  conceive  an  intelligent  being 
looking  upon  a  mass  of  nebulous  matter 
having  only  those  forms  of  association 
which  are  possible  in  gases,  we  must  be- 
lieve that  such  a  being  would  have  been 
entirely  unable,  if  his  intelligence  were 
less  than  infinite,  to  form  any  conception 
of  the  result  which  would  arise  when  that 
matter  came  to  take  the  present  shape  of 
this  earth.  Thus  at  the  outset  we  see 
that  we  cannot  properly  extend  the  con- 
ception of  uniformity,  which  we  gain  from 
our  limited  knowledge  of  the  permanence 
of  matter  and  the  persistence  of  force, 
very  far.  The  original  elemental  diver- 


56  CRITICAL  POINTS. 

sity  of  the  universe  directly  provides  for 
the  most  unexpected  results  in  the  course 
of  the  successive  combinations  of  its 
atomic  units. 

Turning  now  from  these  general  consid- 
erations based  upon  the  complexity  of 
matter,  let  us  consider  the  element  of  the 
unexpected  which  arises  from  the  varia- 
tions in  the  application  of  energy  to  the 
elemental  combinations,  variations  which 
are  independent  of  the  materials  asso- 
ciated in  these  combined  substances.  It 
is  my  purpose  to  call  attention  to  the  well 
known  but  much  disregarded  fact  that, 
with  variations  in  the  amount  of  energy 
to  which  it  is  subjected,  the  behavior  of 
matter  may  alter  in  a  manner  calculated 
to  bring  about  most  unforeseeable  and 
divergent  consequences.  I  desire  also  to 
show  that  these  variations  may  occur  with 
extreme  suddenness,  indeed  with  revolu- 
tionary rapidity,  and  that  through  this 
action  there  may  come  about  in  the  visi- 
ble world  very  great  modifications  in  con- 


AN  ILLUSTRATION.  57 

dition,  made,  so  to  speak,  in  the  twinkling 
of  an  eye.  The  circumstances  under 
which  these  revolutions  occur  I  shall 
term  critical  points.  By  a  critical  point 
I  mean  a  station  or  period  in  the  series  of 
changing  conditions  at  which  a  new  mode 
of  action  is  suddenly  introduced. 

I  can  perhaps  best  explain  my  meaning 
of  the  term  "critical  point"  by  a  simple  il- 
lustration. Let  us  imagine  a  sphere  revolv- 
ing in  space  about  a  central  sun.  Let  us 
conceive  that  in  the  simplest  condition 
the  planet  pursues  an  orbit  which  is  af- 
fected only  by  the  gravitative  energy  of 
the  two  bodies,  and  which  is  therefore  a 
perfect  circle.  Now  let  us  imagine  that 
the  revolving  sphere  is  subjected  to  a 
gradually  increasing  attraction  which  leads 
it  away  from  the  controlling  sun  in  some 
definite  direction.  Under  these  condi- 
tions the  body  will  have  its  orbit  grad- 
ually changed  into  an  ellipse  of  greater 
and  greater  elongation.  Then  the  in- 
creasing attraction  will  at  a  certain  point 


58  CRITICAL  POINTS. 

change  its  path  to  the  parabolic  form. 
Up  to  a  certain  position  in  this  series  of 
changes,  the  sphere  will  continue  to  obey 
the  attraction  of  the  sun  which  originally 
altogether  controlled  its  motion ;  but  be- 
yond that  point  it  will  suddenly  change 
its  orbit  to  a  hyperbolic  form.  It  may 
then  no  longer  return  about  the  parent 
sun,  but  depart  from  it  altogether.  By 
this  illustration  we  see  how  in  the  course 
of  successive  gradual  changes,  each  of  in- 
finitely small  amount,  we  may  in  the  end 
attain  a  critical  point,  leading  to  conse- 
quences which  are  indefinitely  great.  The 
place  in  the  series  where  the  orbit  ceases 
to  lead  back  to  the  parent  sun  is  clearly 
of  revolutionary  importance.  The  fore- 
going is  perhaps  the  simplest  illustration 
of  the  nature  of  a  critical  point,  for  in  it 
we  can  see  a  variation  in  but  one  con- 
dition, that  of  the  gravitating  impulse 
alone. 

Next  we  may  note  a  few  of  the  striking 
instances  which  may  be  observed  in  the 


CHANGES  OF  TEMPERATURE.  $Q 

field  where  materials  are  affected  by  tem- 
perature.    Perhaps  the   most   familiar  of 
these  actions  are  found  in  the  cases   in 
which  matter  passes  from  the  state  of  a 
gas,  first  into  the  liquid  and  then  into  the 
solid  form.     In  this  series  of  changes  the 
molecules   or  atoms  are   held   apart   and 
maintained  in   the  gaseous   state  by  the 
action  of  heat.      By  progressive  cooling, 
due  to  the  escape  of  the  energy,  the  mass 
assumes  the  fluid  form.      A  yet  further 
loss   reduces    it    to    the   solid    condition. 
Each  of  these  transitions,  though  brought 
about  by  a  progressive  and  undiscrimina- 
tive  series  of  changes,  is  usually  accom- 
plished in  a  sudden  manner.      The  pas- 
sages from  the   gaseous   to  the   fluid  or 
from  the  fluid  to  the  solid  state  are,  speak- 
ing   generally,    immediate,     though     the 
changes   of    temperature  which    lead    to 
them  are  absolutely  continuous.     A  very 
striking  instance  of  this  action  is  seen  in 
the  case  of  water  when  that  substance  is 
affected  by  variations  in  heat.      Within 


6O  CRITICAL  POINTS. 

the  limit  of  temperatures  which  may  be 
readily  observed  on  the  surface  of  the 
earth,  water  or  its  components  exist  in 
several  diverse  conditions.  With  a  cer- 
tain high  temperature,  the  elements  which 
compose  water  are  disassociated  and  exist 
as  two  very  diverse  gases,  neither  of 
which  has  any  trace  of  the  physical  prop- 
erties of  the  fluid  which  is  formed  by 
their  union.  With  a  lower  temperature, 
together  with  certain  influences  which 
may  serve  to  bring  about  a  chemical 
union  of  the  elements,  the  oxygen  and 
hydrogen  enter  into  relations  with  each 
other,  producing  water.  Given  a  suffi- 
ciently high  temperature,  the  conjoined 
elements  may  continue  in  the  state  of 
vapor.  At  a  certain  lower  temperature 
we  perceive  that  the  vapor  is  suddenly 
converted  into  a  liquid.  Each  of  these 
changes  occurs  suddenly  and  is  revolution- 
ary in  its  effects. 

Within   the    limits   of    heat    in  which 
water  is  liquid  we  find  a  number  of  crit- 


THE  PROPERTIES  OF  WATER.  6 1 

ical  points  dependent  upon  the  tempera- 
ture. The  most  noteworthy  of  these  is 
where  at  about  39°  Fahr.  the  material 
which  has  hitherto  been  contracting  in 
the  process  of  cooling  suddenly  begins  to 
expand.  This  increase  in  volume  it  main- 
tains until  at  the  freezing  point  it  at  once 
becomes  solid,  and  in  so  doing  acquires  a 
totally  different  set  of  physical  properties 
from  those  it  had  before. 

We  should  now  attend  to  the  fact  that 
the  properties  of  water  in  these  three 
conditions  have  entirely  different  relations 
to  the  numerous  other  substances  with 
which  that  material  comes  in  contact.  In 
its  vaporous  form,  water  is  capable  of  tak- 
ing almost  all  other  chemical  compounds 
and  a  great  number  of  the  elements  into 
solution,  but  on  the  whole  its  dissolving 
power  differs  widely  from  that  which  it 
has  in  the  liquid  state.  In  the  form  of 
vapor  it  is  entirely  incapable  of  establish- 
ing any  relations,  such  as  those  which  are 
acquired  in  the  formation  of  organic 


62  CRITICAL  POINTS. 

bodies.  In  the  liquid  state  we  also  find 
that  water  has  certain  very  peculiar  func- 
tions, differing  in  an  essential  way  from 
those  possessed  by  its  diffused  form. 

It  is  only  in  its  liquid  state  that  water 
can  enter  into  those  combinations  with 
various  substances  which  afford  the  foun- 
dation for  the  greater  part  of  the  chemic 
and  organic  life  of  the  earth.  In  its 
gaseous  state  water  plays  a  very  active 
dynamic  r61e ;  in  the  liquid,  the  dynamic 
work  is  limited,  while  the  range  of  chemi- 
cal activities  is  vastly  extended.  In  its 
gaseous  condition  water  stores  up  energy 
derived  from  heat ;  passing  to  the  liquid 
state  it  applies  in  the  descending  rain  the 
husbanded  force  to  the  earth's  surface. 

Downward  in  the  scale  of  temperature 
we  attain  another  critical  point  in  the 
conditions  of  water  which  depends,  not 
upon  the  physical  property  of  the  fluid 
alone,  but  also  upon  the  relation  of  its 
qualities  to  other  substances.  At  about 
150°  Fahr.  we  pass  into  a  part  of  the  tern- 


ORGANIC  LIFE.  63 

perature  scale  where  the  combinations  of 
water  with  other  substances  begin  which 
make  organic  life  possible.  From  this 
part  of  the  scale  down  to  the  freezing 
point  of  water  we  find  a  realm  of  action 
in  which  occurs  the  whole  evolution  of 
organic  life.  At  the  freezing  point  an 
instantaneous  revolution  takes  place  as 
the  substance  passes  from  the  liquid  to 
the  solid  state ;  from  a  condition  in  which 
it  is  the  type  of  instability  and  the  vehicle 
of  the  earth's  activities,  it  changes  to  a 
rigid  form  in  which  it  appears  to  be  capa- 
ble of  no  movement  except  that  derived 
from  the  gravitative  impulse.  In  the 
body  of  an  animal  water  is  the  agent  of 
inconceivably  numerous  and  varied  actions 
which  continue  as  long  as  it  remains  in 
the  mobile  state.  Converted  into  a  solid, 
it  may  act  as  an  arrester  of  all  change ;  it 
may  preserve  the  tissues  of  a  dead  crea- 
ture from  decay,  even  for  a  geologic  age, 
as  in  the  case  of  the  Siberian  mammoths. 
Above  the  freezing  temperature  the 


64  CRITICAL  POINTS. 

physical  conditions  of  water  in  relation  to 
the  other  elements  vary  with  every  altera- 
tion in  the  measure  of  heat  which  it  con- 
tains. Below  that  point  down  to  the  level 
of  the  greatest  cold  which  we  are  able  to 
observe,  it  remains  substantially  unchanged 
in  all  its  relations  to  other  substances. 
Thus,  at  the  freezing  point,  in  an  instan- 
taneous manner,  this  substance  absolutely 
reverses  nearly  all  its  relations  to  the  sur- 
rounding world. 

The  important  relations  of  water  to  the 
physical  universe  make  its  critical  points 
more  evident  to  us  than  those  of  any 
other  substance.  Yet,  on  examination,  we 
perceive  that  not  only  the  chemical  com- 
pounds which  are  known  to  us,  but  the 
elements  also,  those  substances  which  we 
suppose  to  be  simple  in  their  composition, 
exhibit  substantially  the  same  feature  of 
critical  points  in  the  scale  of  temperature. 
Experiments  show  that  oxygen,  hydrogen, 
and  other  fundamental  substances  which 
at  ordinary  temperatures  remain  in  the 


RESULTS  OF  INTERACTION.  65 

gaseous  form,  with  sufficient  cooling  pass 
first  into  the  liquid,  and  then  into  the 
solid  state,  accomplishing  these  changes 
of  condition  with  critical  rapidity.  As 
before  noted,  each  of  these  substances  and 
the  critical  points  of  each  are  more  or  less 
related  to  all  the  others.  The  critical 
points  of  carbon  in  the  state  where  it 
unites  with  oxygen,  the  critical  points  of 
all  substances  which  enter  into  relation 
with  water,  affect  one  another  in  all  the 
combinations  which  take  place  in  the  or- 
dinary processes  of  nature.  Thus  the 
operation  of  this  visible  machinery  of  the 
world  depends  in  an  inconceivable  mea- 
sure on  the  interaction  of  these  critical 
points  derived  from  the  relation  of  sub- 
stances to  heat. 

It  is  not  difficult  to  see  that  a  very  large 
part  of  the  phenomena  of  this  sphere  is 
brought  about  by  the  relations  of  these 
critical  points  of  the  various  substances 
to  one  another.  Thus,  for  example,  let  us 
take  the  relations  of  the  critical  points  of 


66  CRITICAL  POINTS. 

water  'to  those  of  the  various  materials 
which  enter  into  the  organic  body  and  are 
necessary  for  its  construction.  It  hap- 
pens that  the  critical  points  of  carbonic 
acid,  or  the  places  in  the  temperature 
scale  where  it  becomes  gaseous,  liquid,  or 
solid,  are  so  fixed  with  reference  to  tem- 
perature that  its  solidifying  and  vaporiz- 
ing are  below  the  zero  of  our  temperature 
scale.  Were  it  otherwise,  were  the  solidi- 
fying point  of  this  substance,  we  will  say, 
at  the  temperature  of  boiling  water,  or- 
ganic life  would  be  impossible,  and  the 
activities  of  the  world  would  be  limited 
to  purely  physical  changes. 

To  extend  our  conception  of  this  inter- 
action of  critical  points,  let  us  consider  in 
the  first  place  that  organic  life,  as  mani- 
fested on  the  earth's  surface,  depends 
upon  a  coincidence  in  the  qualities  of  a 
score  or  more  substances  within  a  certain 
range  of  temperature,  and  also  on  the 
occurrence  on  the  earth's  surface  of  a 
certain  limited  range  of  heat  which  must 


NARROW  SPAN  OF  ORGANIC  LIFE.    6/ 

be  maintained  in  order  to  make  it  possible 
for  these  substances,  at  their  particular 
critical  points,  to  cooperate  in  the  produc- 
tion of  life.  The  maintenance  of  a  cer- 
tain temperature  on  the  earth's  surface 
depends  in  turn  upon  the  coincidence  of 
a  variety  of  physical  conditions,  the  ac- 
tions of  which,  in  order  that  life  be  possi- 
ble, must  be  balanced  with  extreme  nicety. 
The  delicacy  of  this  adjustment  may  be 
judged  when  we  consider  the  vast  range 
in  heat  which  exists  within  the  limits  of 
our  solar  system.  The  temperature  of 
the  sun  is  probably  to  be  measured  by  the 
hundred  thousand  degrees ;  that  of  the 
space  intervening  between  the  solar  centre 
and  the  earth  is  certainly  hundreds  of 
degrees  below  zero ;  that  of  the  earth's 
interior  is  probably  more  than  ten  thou- 
sand degrees.  In  this  great  scale  of  heat 
organic  life  can  only  occupy  the  narrow 
span  of  about  one  hundred  degrees,  or 
from  about  32  to  near  135,  or,  perhaps,  the 
one  thousandth  part  of  the  temperature 


68  CRITICAL  POINTS. 

variation  which  the  solar  system  affords. 
Thus,  the  possibility  of  organic  life  de- 
pends upon  the  occurrence  at  the  earth's 
surface  of  a  temperature  not  exceeding  a 
range  of  about  one  hundred  degrees,  while 
the  actual  temperature  range  of  the  solar 
system  exceeds  one  hundred  thousand  de- 
grees of  variation. 

To  secure  a  clearer  conception  of  these 
conditions,  let  us  convert  the  data  from 
terms  of  abstract  number  to  terms  of 
length.  In  a  line  one  hup  Ired  thousand 
inches  in  length,  an  extension  of  about 
one  mile  and  a  half,  let  the  space  of  each 
inch  represent  one  degree  of  Fahrenheit. 
On  that  scale  mark  off  a  space  of  eight 
feet  near  one  end,  and  this  trifling  part  of 
the  length  of  the  whole  line  may  give  us 
a  diagrammatic  representation  of  the  ratios 
between  the  temperatures  of  the  solar 
system  and  those  in  which  organic  life 
can  be  maintained.  If  at  any  time  the 
temperature  of  the  earth's  surface  should 
in  general  fall  below  or  rise  much  above 


TEMPERATURE   OF  THE  EARTH.      69 

the  narrow  limits  which  have  been  indi- 
cated, the  result  would,  in  a  brief  time,  be 
the  destruction  of  organic  life.  Now,  we 
know  with  certainty  that  for  a  hundred 
million  years  or  more  such  a  departure 
from  the  prevailing  temperature  has  never 
taken  place  on  the  earth's  surface,  and  this 
by  the  fact  that  the  series  of  organic 
forms  have  continued  unbroken  and  in 
continuous  development,  both  on  the  land 
and  in  the  sea,  for  something  like  this 
vast  period  of  time.  From  age  to  age 
changes  have  occurred  on  the  earth's  sur- 
face which  clearly  show  that  in  high  lati- 
tudes great  alterations  in  the  measure  of 
heat  occur  and  continue  for  periods  of 
considerable  duration.  Glacial  sheets  now 
and  then  extend  toward  the  tropics,  and 
again  the  tropical  climate  moves  far  to- 
ward the  poles,  but  very  soon  some  check 
on  these  extravagances  comes  into  opera- 
tion;  after  a  brief  period  of  instability 
the  regime  of  the  earth's  climate  returns 
to  its  normal  state,  and  the  adjustment  of 
temperature  is  restored. 


70  CRITICAL  POINTS. 

It  would  be  possible  to  extend  these 
evidences  of  the  balanced  relation  of  crit- 
ical points  in  reference  to  organic  life 
much  further  than  we  have  done.  We 
may  note  the  organization  of  the  atmos- 
phere, for  instance,  and  show  how  the 
ratio  of  its  several  ingredients  to  each 
other,  notwithstanding  the  fact  that  the 
circumstances  seem  to  lead  to  a  profound 
instability  in  their  relations,  has  been  pre- 
served through  all  the  geological  time 
which  is  recorded  in  our  fossil  -  bearing 
strata.  We  may  observe  the  proportion 
of  carbonic  dioxide  or  carbonic  acid  gas 
which  is  present  in  the  atmosphere.  It  is 
absolutely  essential  to  the  preservation  of 
organic  life  that  this  material  shall  exist 
in  the  air,  for  the  reason  that  the  plants 
depend  upon  it  for  sustenance ;  but  the 
proportion  of  it  to  the  bulk  of  the  atmos- 
pheric envelope  must  never  exceed  a  very 
small  portion  of  its  weight.  To  serve  its 
purpose  it  is  probably  essential  that  it 
should  exist  in  the  proportion  of  not  less 


CARBONIC  ACID  GAS.  Jl 

than  one  tenth  of  one  per  cent,  and  not 
more  than  one  hundredth  of  the  atmos- 
pheric mass.  If  the  quantity  of  this  gas 
should  become  much  less  than  it  now  is, 
vegetable  life  would  cease;  if  it  should 
ever  be  present  in  excess,  animal  life,  at 
least  in  its  higher  forms,  would  disappear. 
We  should  now  observe  that  the  quantity 
of  this  gaseous  carbon  which  is  taken 
from  the  atmosphere  and  built  into  the 
rocks  in  any  geological  epoch,  say  in  a 
period  of  one  million  years,  is  certainly 
greater  than  all  which  at  any  one  time 
can  be  present  in  the  atmosphere  which 
sustains  life.  Few  geologists  will  doubt 
the  statement  that  at  least  one  hundred 
times  as  much  carbon  has  passed  through 
the  air  on  its  way  into  the  strata  as  has  at 
any  one  time  since  organic  life  began 
been  contained  in  the  aerial  envelope.  It 
is  evident  that  there  are  some  phenomena 
of  compensation  or  adjustment  in  the 
complicated  actions  which  serve  to  bring 
gaseous  carbon  into  the  atmosphere  or  to 


72  CRITICAL  POINTS. 

remove  it  therefrom,  and  that  this  ar- 
rangement preserves  the  necessary  bal- 
ance in  a  singularly  accurate  manner.  It 
is  as  yet  undetermined  how  the  required 
supply  of  carbonic  acid  gas  is  thus  con- 
stantly and  uniformly  fed  into  the  atmos- 
phere. The  students  of  the  problem  are 
now  inclined  to  believe  that  it  enters  the 
realm  mainly  from  the  celestial  spaces, 
possibly  in  small  carbonaceous  meteorites 
which  burn  in  the  upper  parts  of  the 
air. 

A  little  consideration  will  show  us  that 
these  critical  points,  and  especially  their 
adjustment  one  to  the  other,  exercise  a 
profound  influence  on  the  course  and  as- 
pect of  the  material  world.  The  revolu- 
tion which  occurs  in  each  of  these  sub- 
stances as  it  passes  its  critical  point,  the 
change  in  its  mode  of  action  and  in  its 
physical  properties,  and  the  interaction  of 
these  changes  of  one  substance  with  those 
of  another,  introduce  an  element  of  varia- 
tion which  must  qualify  the  conception  of 


LA  TENT  PO  WERS.  73 

uniformity  in  the  universe  which  we  de- 
rive from  the  ideas  of  continuity  of  causa- 
tion and  of  the  indestructibility  of  force 
and  matter.  We  see  that  at  each  of  these 
revolutionary  stages  the  change  in  the 
conditions  of  any  substance  may  result  in 
causing  a  total  alteration  as  to  the  effects 
of  the  energy  which  operates  in  and 
through  it.  Thus,  in  place  of  imagining 
the  physical  world  as  the  seat  of  absolutely 
continuous  work,  we  are,  by  such  consid- 
erations, compelled  to  conceive  it  as  a. 
field  in  which,  though  the  energy  and  the 
matter  on  which  energy  operates  are  both 
constant,  the  direction  in  which  this  force 
may  work,  and  all  the  consequences,  o£  its 
action,  may  be  subjected  to  the  most 
sudden  revolutions.  It  is  evident  that  in 
each  elemental  substance  we  have  a.  cer- 
tain latent  directing  power  which  entirely 
escapes  ordinary  apprehension.  Until  the 
proper  moment  arrives,  this  hidden  and 
inconceivable  determinant  exists  only  in 
a  potential  state ;  but  at  the  appointed 


74  CRITICAL  POINTS. 

time  it  may  so  change  the  operations  of 
the  force  which  acts  upon  the  matter  that 
the  profoundest  revolution  can  be  accom- 
plished. We  have  only  to  consider  the 
effects  of  the  passage  of  water  across  that 
slight,  indeed,  we  may  say  infinitely  small, 
increment  or  decrement  of  temperature 
which  separates  the  solid  and  liquid  con- 
ditions, in  order  to  conceive  the  impor- 
tance of  the  principle  which  we  are  en- 
deavoring to  understand.  These  critical 
revolutions  in  matter,  it  is  true,  modify 
only  the  results  of  force ;  they  do  not 
affect  the  total  energy  which  the  universe 
contains. 

We  may  now  in  a  measure  perceive  the 
way  in  which  we  have  to  limit  the  idea  of 
causation.  We  note  that,  although  this 
idea  of  continuity  as  applied  to  matter  and 
energy  is  a  vast  and  most  informing  con- 
ception, it  does  not  of  itself  alone  enable 
us  to  explain  the  occurrences  which  take 
place  in  the  universe,  or  even  give  us  an 
idea  of  their  mode  of  happening.  At  first 


MODE  OF  ACTION  IN  NATURE.        f$ 

sight  this  conception  of  continuity  sug- 
gests to  the  mind  a  sense  of  identity  in 
the  direction  of  the  action  of  the  given 
cause  and  of  the  succession  of  events 
which  it  brings  about.  We  unjustifiably 
conceive  the  processions  of  phenomena  in 
the  physical  world  as  going  forward,  as  it 
were,  on  straight  lines;  but  the  forego- 
ing considerations,  though  only  a  small 
part  of  those  which  could  be  adduced,  in- 
dicate to  us  that  we  have  in  the  mechan- 
ism a  provision  for  the  most  sudden  de- 
partures from  the  direction  which  events 
may  have  hitherto  followed.  In  this  re- 
vised picture  of  the  mode  of  action  in  the 
field  of  nature  to  which  we  come  from  a 
study  of  critical  points  in  particular  ele- 
ments, and  the  larger  similar  points  which 
arise  from  the  interaction  of  the  first  in 
various  compounded  substances,  we  see 
that  our  ideas  as  to  the  mode  of  action 
have  to  be  greatly  modified.  This  world 
is  thus  to  be  conceived  as  a  place  of 
surprises  which  take  place  under  natural 


76  CRITICAL  POINTS. 

law,  but  are  quite  as  revolutionary  as  if 
they  were  the  products  of  chance,  or  a  re- 
sult arising  from  the  immediate  interven- 
tion of  the  Supreme  Power.  It  is  evident, 
moreover,  that  the  existence  of  critical 
points  makes  the  interpretation  of  the 
world  much  more  difficult  than  it  would 
jjbe  if  such  accidents  did  not  occur. 

It  does  not  seem  likely  that  we  shall 
ever  be  able  to  predict  the  nature  of  these 
critical  latencies  of  matter  in  states  of 
which  we  have  had  no  experience.  Cer- 
tainly, at  present  we  have  no  means  of 
conceiving  the  conditions  of  substances  at 
temperatures  of  which  we  cannot  make  ac- 
quaintance by  observation  or  experiment. 
In  the  present  state  of  our  knowledge,  we 
know,  for  instance,  the  critical  point  at 
which  oxygen  passes  to  the  solid  state 
at  a  temperature  far  below  zero  ;  but  we 
know  nothing  of  the  properties  which  that 
substance  may  possess  at  possible  other 
critical  points  beyond  the  degree  of  heat 
to  which  we  have  seen  it  subjected.  At 


ORGANIC  STRUCTURES.  .77 

temperatures  other  than  those  in  which 
we  observe,  the  substances  in  nature  may 
suddenly  develop  properties  which  revo- 
lutionize the  condition  of  the  field  in 
which  the  particular  association  of  matter 
and  of  temperature  occurs. 

Turning  from  the  domain  of  inorganic 
matter,  let  us  now  consider  the  other 
realm,  in  which  substances  take  on  the 
shape  which  we  term  organic.  In  that 
field  we  have  not  only  to  deal  with  the 
elements  in  their  uncombined  state  or  in 
the  various  forms  of  association  which 
prevail  in  the  inorganic  world,  but  we  find 
certain  of  them  entering  upon  extremely 
complex  forms  of  association.  With  each 
of  these  almost  infinitely  numerous  va- 
rieties of  associated  matter  which  exist 
in  animals  and  plants  we  have  not  only 
the  determining  influence  of  the  original 
critical  point  proper  to  the  materials,  but 
we  have  in  each  of  the  associations  par- 
ticular crises  which  apparently  are  not  to 
be  predicted  from  any  known  condition 


78  CRITICAL  POINTS. 

of  the  several  elements  which  compose 
them.  Thus  organic  structures,  from  the 
very  great  number  of  the  interacting  ma- 
terials of  which  they  are  composed,  repre- 
sent a  far  more  complicated  equation  of 
physical  influences  than  any  inorganic 
association  of  substances.  Besides  the 
physical  combinations  of  elements  which 
constitute  organisms  and  which  may  de- 
pend upon  their  material  relations,  we 
find  in  these  living  forms  a  host  of  other 
motives  and  impulses  which  are  not  evi- 
dently due  to  the  mere  physical  state  of 
their  body.  These  motives  we  may  term 
the  inheritances  of  the  organism,  impulses 
which  are  derived  from  the  previous  life 
of  the  individual  in  its  own  body  or  in 
that  of  its  ancestors. 

The  leading  or  more  important  inher- 
itances are  impulses  derived  from  the  an- 
cestral experience  of  the  organic  form. 
We  have  to  imagine  them  as  essentially 
separate  motives  handed  down  from  gen- 
eration to  generation,  sometimes  remain- 


INHERITED  IMPULSES.  ?Q 

ing  latent  for  great  periods,  to  become 
suddenly  manifested  under  conditions  the 
nature  of  which  is  not  yet  discernible, 
and  which  bids  fair  to  remain  perma- 
nently unknown.  Except  by  their  mani- 
festations these  inheritances  elude  percep- 
tion. Even  the  imagination  of  our  most 
fertile  naturalists  has  not  yet  suggested  a 
conceivable  way  by  which  they  may  be 
transmitted.  In  many  cases  these  mo- 
tives which  are  handed  down  to  us  from 
our  ancestors  may  be  utterly  unprofitable ; 
indeed,  their  existence  is  only  here  and 
there  revealed  to  us  by  some  exceptional 
accident  which  is  quite  out  of  the  order 
of  usual  events. 

I  venture  to  describe  one  of  these  ex- 
ceptional facts,  which,  though  quite  well 
known  to  naturalists,  is  unfamiliar  to  the 
general  reader ;  choosing  it  for  the  reason 
that  it  is  a  peculiarly  striking  instance, 
and  one  well  suited  to  show  us  how  he- 
reditary tendencies  may  for  an  indefinite 
period  remain  latent,  and  then  become 


8O  CRITICAL   POINTS. 

most  plainly  manifested.  In  all  the  ver- 
tebrated  animals  above  the  level  of  the 
fishes,  —  that  is,  in  all  amphibians,  rep- 
tiles, birds,  and  mammals,  —  the  number 
of  the  digits  or  of  fingers  and  toes  is  nor- 
mally five  on  each  extremity.  The  excep- 
tions to  this  general  rule  are  so  definitely 
limited  and  so  explicable  that  they  may 
be  neglected,  except  to  state  that,  when- 
ever these  exceptions  occur,  they  are  al- 
most always  in  the  nature  of  a  reduction 
in  the  number  of  these  digits.  Where  the 
number  is  increased,  the  augmentation  is 
to  be  explained  on  the  principle  of  rever- 
sion to  the  characteristics  of  a  lower  an- 
cestral species. 

When,  in  following  the  ascending  series 
of  vertebrate  forms,  we  come  to  the  group 
of  animals  which  have  a  close  physical 
kinship  with  our  kind,  we  find  a  number 
of  the  digits  almost  invariable.  In  all 
forms  which  can  be  regarded  as  in  or  near 
the  stem  of  man's  genealogical  tree,  the 
number  of  fingers  and  toes,  except  for  the 


SUPERNUMERARY  DIGITS.  8 1 

accidents  we  are  about  to  describe,  is  in- 
variably five.  It  is,  in  a  word,  evident 
that  this  pentadactylic  character  of  the 
vertebrate  extremity  was  instituted  almost 
immediately  after  the  development  of  the 
series  above  the  level  of  the  fishes,  and 
that  inheritance  has  fixed  it  in  the  gno- 
mons of  species  which  led  to  the  human 
form  in  a  very  firm  manner.  Yet  now  and 
then  among  these  five-fingered  forms  we 
find  an  additional  digit  occurring.  These 
chance  duplications  of  fingers  and  toes  are 
more  common  in  the  lower  mammals,  espe- 
cially in  the  carnivora,  than  in  man  ;  but 
they  not  infrequently  occur  in  human  be- 
ings. The  rate  of  their  happening  prob- 
ably differs  considerably  among  various 
peoples ;  but  in  general  it  is  likely  that 
one  such  case  exists  in  somewhere  be- 
tween one  hundred  thousand  and  one  mil- 
lion births.  Although  there  is  consider- 
able variety  in  the  conditions  of  these 
supernumerary  digits,  they  commonly  ap- 
pear on  the  side  of  the  hand  or  foot,  next 


82  CRITICAL  POINTS. 

to  the  little  finger  or  the  little  toe.  They 
are  usually  provided  with  a  system  of 
bones  and  muscles,  in  the  manner  of  the 
normal  digits. 

If  these  rare  variations  in  the  number 
of  digits  were  limited  to  a  single  exces- 
sive part,  we  might  be  tempted  to  account 
for  them  by  the  question  -  begging  sup- 
position that  they  are  mere  redundant 
growths,  or  we  might  make  the  more  con- 
venient and  perhaps  equally  rational  ex- 
planation that  they  are  matter  of  chance  ; 
but  we  are  startled  to  find  that  when  these 
supernumerary  digits  are  removed,  they 
have,  according  to  some  authorities,  the 
extraordinary  power  of  growing  again.  It 
is  a  matter  of  familiar  experience  that  the 
normal  fingers  and  toes  do  not  have  this 
capacity  of  renewing  themselves  after  they 
have  been  destroyed.  These  facts,  from 
their  exceptional  nature,  demand  a  careful 
explanation.  Fortunately  they  at  the  same 
time  give  us  a  hint  as  to  the  cause  of  their 
occurrence. 


A    CONJECTURAL  REALM.  83 

There  can  be  little  doubt  that  the  ex- 
planation which  we  have  to  apply  to  these 
abnormal  growths  is  as  follows :  when 
the  fishes  began  to  pass  upward  into  the 
groups  where  limbs  and  their  extremities 
attained  a  more  definite  and  elaborated 
organization  than  we  find  in  the  fin,  the 
first  steps  towards  this  higher  state  of  the 
extremities  probably  took  place  in  a  series 
of  creatures  which  have  disappeared  from 
the  earth,  and  whose  history  is  now  lost 
in  our  paleontological  record,  where  the 
digits  were  more  numerous  and  less  well 
defined  than  they  now  are  in  the  elevated 
vertebrates.  In  this  lower  and  conjec- 
tural realm,  the  habit  of  having  fingers 
and  toes  to  a  greater  number  than  five 
was  firmly  impressed  on  the  organism, 
and  thus  became  the  subject  of  some- 
what obstinate  inheritance.  When  in  the 
course  of  advance,  by  natural  selection 
or  other  processes,  the  number  of  digits 
was  reduced  to  five,  there  remained  in  the 
body  to  be  handed  on  from  generation  to 


84  CRITICAL  POINTS. 

generation  a  latent  and,  so  far  as  we  can 
conceive,  utterly  unprofitable  tendency 
towards  the  production  of  the  old  lost 
fingers  and  toes.  From  one  species  to 
another  onwards  through  millions  or  hun- 
dreds of  millions  of  generations  this  an- 
cestral impulse  has  survived,  —  never 
strong  enough  so  to  prevail  over  the 
forces  which  lead  to  the  five  -  fingered 
body  that  it  could  give  rise  to  six-fin- 
gered species,  but  ever  trying  to  assert  its 
power,  and  here  and  there  marking  the 
obdurate  continuity  of  the  effort  in  occa- 
sional temporary  successes. 

It  is  not  to  be  believed  that  the  impulse 
which  leads  to  supernumerary  digits  is 
the  only  one  of  these  inherited  impulses 
which  remain  latent  amid  the  vast  array 
of  motives,  the  effective  inheritances, 
which  exist  in  the  higher  organism.  We 
must  conceive  a  great  number  of  these 
inheritances  to  continue  latent  in  the  or- 
ganism without  even  the  remote  chance 
of  claiming  the  right  to  presentation 


POTENTIAL  MOTIVES.  85 

which  is  granted  to  the  impulse  to  poly- 
dactylism.  It  is  perfectly  clear  that  the 
human  body  has  passed  through  thou- 
sands of  forms,  specifically  different  the 
one  from  the  other ;  each  having  definite 
peculiarities,  each  sending  on  in  the  pro- 
cession of  life  a  shadow  of  itself  which 
has  been  transmitted  from  species  to  spe- 
cies to  the  existing  state  of  man  or  the 
other  higher  animals.  We  may  thus  im- 
agine each  organic  species  to  embody  not 
only  the  impulses  which  are  effective  in 
the  development  of  its  shape,  and  which 
serve  to  determine  the  functions  of  the 
body,  but  also  a  vastly  greater  number  of 
unsatisfied  motives,  remaining  dormant, 
yet  abiding  as  potentialities  which  may 
from  time  to  time  prove  influential  in  the 
history  of  the  creature. 

We  probably  perceive  the  influence  of 
these  latent  inheritances  when,  in  the 
battle  of  existence,  species  undergo  retro- 
grade changes,  or,  as  naturalists  phrase  it, 
revert  to  a  lower  state  of  being.  In  this 


86  CRITICAL  POINTS. 

process  of  reversion,  the  inheritances 
which  lead  toward  the  higher  modifica- 
tions dimmish  in  energy ;  the  old  long-un- 
satisfied tendencies,  being  left  unopposed, 
obtain  their  chance  of  action  ;  the  result 
is  that  the  form  degrades  in  structure, 
passing  through,  though  in  reverse  order, 
the  steps  which  led  it  upward,  and  under- 
going the  modifications  of  decline  with 
greater  rapidity  than  they  were  accom- 
plished during  the  period  of  ascent.  In 
the  moral  as  well  as  in  the  physical  world, 
we  may  see  these  hidden  seeds  of  ancestral 
impulse,  when  no  longer  overshadowed  by 
the  newer  and  therefore  stronger  motives, 
spring  into  activity,  and  win  the  creature 
back  to  a  lower  estate. 

It  is  hardly  necessary  to  say  that  we 
cannot  fairly  compare  the  interaction  of 
associated  organic  impulses  with  that 
which  takes  place  in  organic  matter.  It 
must  be  confessed  that  the  relation  is,  so 
far  as  we  can  perceive,  mainly  analogical. 
Nevertheless,  the  analogy  has  its  value  to 


A    COMPARISON.  8/ 

us ;  for,  as  we  may  readily  imagine,  each 
of  these  impulses  derived  from  inheritance 
is  combined  with  the  other  conditions 
existing  in  the  organic  body  much  in  the 
same  manner  as  the  interacting  impulses 
in  the  physical  world.  We  may  make  a 
comparison  between  the  organic  and  the 
inorganic  world  more  effective  if  we  limit 
ourselves  in  our  choice  of  physical  exam- 
ples to  those  correspondences  which  we 
may  obtain  from  the  motions  of  matter, 
rather  than  from  the  static  part  of  mate- 
rial phenomena.  Let  us  take  the  motions 
of  waves,  such  as  those  which  produce 
light,  or  the  other  class  of  vibrations 
which  give  rise  to  sound.  It  is  a  well- 
known  fact  that  diverse  vibrations  of 
either  of  these  two  classes  may  coexist  in 
the  same  medium,  provided  their  waves  do 
not  interfere  with  one  another.  With  a 
given  amplitude  of  wave  and  a  given  rate 
of  transmission,  these  impulses  may  move 
on  without  collision  with  one  another; 
but  at  certain  points,  which  we  may  for 


88  CRITICAL  POINTS. 

convenience  also  term  critical,  the  un- 
dulations may  serve,  by  combining  their 
force,  to  increase  the  action.  Again,  they 
may  be  so  combined  as  to  destroy  one 
another.  I  am  forced  to  conceive  in  the 
organic  body,  at  least  where  that  body 
has  a  high  state  of  development,  a  conflict 
unseen,  but  of  momentous  importance, 
among  the  vast  array  of  extremely  diverse 
impulses  derived  from  individual  and  an- 
cestral experience.  The  result  of  this 
conflict  may  be  such,  from  time  to  time,  as 
to  bring  about  an  accumulation  of  energy 
which  serves  so  to  intensify  some  one  or 
more  of  these  inherited  motives  that  the 
form  is  affected  by  it,  and  the  effect  may 
be  transmitted  to  the  offspring.  In  other 
conditions,  the  interferences  may  lead  to 
the  more  or  less  permanent  subjugation 
of  certain  of  these  inherited  tendencies  in 
such  a  manner  as  to  bring  about  a  change 
in  the  shape  of  the  body. 

It  seems  to  me  tolerably  evident  that 
we   cannot    account    for   the    conditions 


CONFLICT  OF  INHERITANCES.         89 

which  serve  to  determine  the  form  of  any 
highly  organized  animal  or  plant  without 
assuming  the  inheritance  of  what  we  may 
safely  call  an  inconceivably  great  number 
and  variety  of  impulses;  nor  can  we  as- 
sume that  these  impulses,  or  any  consider- 
able part  of  them,  are  manifested  in  the 
actual  form  of  the  organism  or  in  the 
interaction  of  its  several  parts.  Beside 
the  indefinite  number  of  impulses  which 
express  themselves  in  the  animal  as  it 
actually  appears  to  our  observation,  there 
must  exist  in  the  organism  a  vast  number 
of  unmanifested  or  faintly  indicated  ten- 
dencies which,  on  account  of  their  weak- 
ness or  other  circumstances,  have  been 
unable  to  bring  about  distinct  observable 
effects.  That  there  is  a  contention  be- 
tween these  tendencies,  leading  to  sudden 
destruction  of  the  prevailing  equilibrium 
which  exists  among  them,  is  evident  from 
such  cases  as  that  which  we  have  just 
reviewed.  It  must  be  conceived  that  this 
combat  goes  on  from  generation  to  gen- 


QO  CRITICAL  POINTS. 

eration.  With  each  successive  stage,  or 
even  in  the  lifetime  of  the  individual,  new 
motives  are  gained  through  experience, 
and  the  old  become  less  vigorous  from  the 
lack  of  manifestation.  Thus  the  equation 
of  the  impulses  which  control  the  organic 
body  must  be  constantly  varying  ;  the  di- 
rection of  development,  dependent  as  it  is 
upon  this  equation  of  impulses,  must  also 
vary. 

It  appears  to  me  that  this  view  affords 
us  a  possible  means  of  explaining  the  va- 
riations which  take  place  in  organic  forms, 
and  that  we  may  perhaps  find  in  it  a 
source  of  change  in  animals  and  plants 
which  has  been  substantially  overlooked. 
It  has  already  been  recognized  that  inher- 
itance affords  us  a  clew  to  the  continui- 
ties exhibited  in  the  series  of  the  organic 
world.  It  now  appears  likely  that  the 
conflict  of  inheritances  may  also  lead 
through  other  lines  of  action  to  the  re- 
verse of  continuity,  in  fact  to  the  insti- 
tution of  variety.  We  may  conceive  the 


THE  INSTITUTION  OF  VARIETY.    91 

organic  species  gaining  from  experience 
and  transmitting  to  the  successive  gen- 
erations a  body  of  diverse  impulses,  of 
tendencies  to  variety  of  form  and  action 
which  are  ever  on  the  watch  for  a  chance 
to  manifest  themselves.  If  these  acted 
singly,  each  for  itself,  the  tendency  would 
be  to  produce  mere  reversions  to  ancestral 
shapes  and  states.  But  if  they  operated 
interactively,  if  they  combined  their  mo- 
tives in  any  way,  as  they  assuredly  do,  it 
may  well  come  about  that  the  changes  in 
structure  or  function  which  they  cause 
would  be  considerable,  and  some  of  them 
might  well  be  in  the  line  of  advancement. 
The  hypothesis  last  set  forth  may  be 
made  the  clearer  by  means  of  an  illus- 
tration. Let  us  suppose  the  tendency  to 
supernumerary  fingers  to  have  been  origi- 
nally of  no  profit  to  the  animal  which  in- 
herited it,  for  the  reason  that  its  habits 
and  its  relations  to  its  environment  in 
general  made  more  than  five  fingers  disad- 
vantageous. In  course  of  time,  we  may 


92  CRITICAL  POINTS. 

well  imagine  that  this  polydactylic  ten- 
dency might  become  combined  with  other 
tendencies,  so  that,  when  the  extra  finger 
or  toe  offered  itself  for  trial  in  the  compe- 
tition of  life,  it  would  not  be  just  what 
that  finger  was  in  the  ancestral  form 
whence  the  constructive  impulse  was  de- 
rived, but  would  be  profoundly  modified 
through  the  commingling  of  other  influ- 
ences. 

This  interaction  of  one  influence  with 
another  is  not  altogether  hypothetical,  for 
we  perceive  in  the  supernumerary  human 
digit  that  it  does  not  appear  in  the  shape 
of  a  batrachian  or  other  prehuman  struc- 
ture, but  in  the  general  form  proper  to 
a  human  body  ;  that  is,  it  represents  the 
result  of  commingled  impulses  which  are 
in  part  inherited  from  a  very  remote  pe- 
riod, and  in  part  derived  from  the  more 
recent  experiences  of  series  of  organisms 
in  which  the  creature  belongs. 

The  reader  probably  now  sees,  as  clearly 
as  the  circumstances  permit,  the  analogy 


IN  THE  MORAL  REALM.  93 

which  I  have  been  endeavoring  to  suggest 
as  possibly  existing  between  the  interac- 
tion of  the  inorganic  elements,  one  with 
another,  and  the  similar  combination  be- 
tween the  separate  but  more  or  less  re- 
lated motives  which  guide  the  develop- 
ment and  control  the  functions  of  the 
organic  body.  As  in  the  elemental  world 
the  combination  of  two  substances  com- 
monly gives  rise  to  a  third,  differing  in 
qualities  from  either  of  the  original  ingre- 
dients, so,  when  the  motives  or  impulses 
of  inheritance  combine  in  the  organic 
body,  the  result  may  exhibit  a  very  great 
complexity,  and  give  rise  to  sudden  and 
most  important  changes. 

This  conception  as  to  the  influence  of 
the  unseen  impulses  which  may  for  a 
time  remain  latent  in  the  organic  body 
appears  to  me  to  have  a  justifiable  ex- 
tension to  the  moral  realm,  and  to  throw 
much  light  on  the  historical  development 
of  peoples  and  on  the  conduct  of  the  indi- 
vidual. The  spectacle  which  is  presented 


94  CRITICAL  POINTS. 

by  the  development  of  any  civilized  state 
affords  us  many  instances  in  which  mo- 
tives slowly  and  insensibly  accumulate  in 
the  minds  of  men,  until  a  great  body  of 
folk  may  at  once  be  aroused  to  revolu- 
tionary action.  Cases  of  this  sort  may  be 
perceived  in  those  great  migrations  which 
from  time  to  time  have  led  the  tribes  of 
northern  Europe  and  of  western  Asia  sud- 
denly to  abandon  their  sedentary  condi- 
tions, and  to  move  forth  over  land  and 
sea  for  great  distances,  under  an  impulse 
which  appears  to  have  affected  in  a  simul- 
taneous manner  a  great  host  of  men.  It 
is  unreasonable  to  suppose  that  these 
movements  were  due  to  a  suddenly  ac- 
quired motive.  We  can  best  explain  them 
by  the  supposition  that  for  generations 
the  equation  of  impulses  which  determined 
the  conduct  of  the  folk  was  undergoing 
a  gradual  change,  which  in  the  end  dis- 
turbed the  ancient  equilibrium,  and  thus 
revolutionized  the  conduct  of  the  people. 
Such  sudden  outbreaks  as  the  so-called 


IN  HISTORY.  95 

French  Revolution  and  similar  political 
changes,  which  simultaneously  occur 
throughout  the  ranks  of  the  people,  with- 
out any  preliminary  period  of  develop- 
ment which  is  sufficient  to  account  for 
the  growth  of  the  motives  which  they  ex- 
hibit, probably  come  into  the  same  class 
of  actions.  They  can  best  be  explained 
by  gradual  changes  in  the  equation  of 
the  unperceived  yet  functioning  impulses 
which  control  the  course  of  human  con- 
duct. 

A  slow  and  long-continued  change  in 
the  organization  of  internal  motives,  ter- 
minating in  a  revolution  in  all  that  re- 
gards the  conduct  of  the  creature,  is  ob- 
servable in  many  groups  of  animals  below 
the  level  of  man.  Thus  in  the  case  of 
the  lemming,  a  little  Norwegian  mammal 
resembling  the  rat,  which  dwells  normally 
in  the  mountain  district  of  the  Kolen 
near  the  borders  of  Finland,  we  find  that 
the  animal  for  many  years  dwells  quietly 
in  its  native  country,  but  at  intervals  of 


96  CRITICAL  POINTS. 

a  few  decades  is  seized  with  a  migratory 
impulse  which  leads  it  to  march  forth  in 
great  bands  across  the  country  to  the 
westward.  In  these  marches  of  the  lem- 
ming the  creatures  pursue  direct  paths, 
turning  aside  only  when  they  meet  an  in- 
superable obstacle  ;  when  they  attain  the 
sea,  they  leap  into  it  and  swim  away  until 
they  are  drowned.  Although  more  insen- 
sate than  the  human  migrations,  these  sud- 
den forced  marches  of  the  lemmings  in  a 
striking  way  resemble  those  of  the  Goths 
who,  in  the  early  centuries  of  our  era, 
went  forth  from  the  same  Scandinavian 
country  and  devastated  the  civilization  of 
southern  Europe.  In  both  cases  the  mi- 
grations appear  to  be  without  distinct  pur- 
pose, and  to  have  been  induced  through 
the  accumulation  of  impulses  to  a  point 
where  their  gratification  became  impera- 
tively necessary. 

In  the  realm  of  morals,  whether  we 
consider  it  from  the  point  of  view  of  indi- 
vidual conduct,  or  the  more  massive  phe- 


A    THEORY  OF  CONSCIENCE.          97 

nomena  which  may  be  exhibited  by  as- 
semblages of  men,  something  of  the  same 
effects  arising  from  the  accumulation  of 
impulses  may  be  discerned.  A  man  or  a 
race  may  continue  steadfastly  in  a  given 
course  of  conduct,  which  is  determined  by 
certain  equations  of  the  spiritual  motives 
which  are  effective  in  regulating  deeds. 
At  a  particular  time  a  hitherto  latent  but 
long-accumulating  impulse  may  become  of 
critical  importance,  and  in  a  sudden  way 
transform  the  emotions  and  change  the 
way  of  life  in  a  measure  which  would  be 
inexplicable  to  psychologists  if  they  had  to 
suppose  the  determination  of  sudden  ori- 
gin. It  seems  to  me  evident  that  through 
the  further  consideration  of  this  series  of 
facts  we  may  be  able  to  support  a  theory 
of  moral  conscience  in  a  way  that  is  at 
once  satisfactory  and  scientific.  We  may 
conceive  the  moral  state  of  each  individ- 
ual to  be  determined  in  part  by  his  inheri- 
tances from  his  ancestors  and  in  part  by 
that  other  form  of  derivation  which  is 


98  CRITICAL  POINTS. 

proper  to  his  individuality  and  is  estab- 
lished by  his  personal  conduct.  If  with 
this  understanding  as  to  the  origin  of  his 
motives  the  individual  further  conceives 
that  his  conduct  depends  upon  an  equation 
between  the  array  of  his  motives,  he  will 
find  a  new  sanction  applied  to  his  depart- 
ures from  the  moral  law.  Every  act 
serves  to  stimulate  and  develop  some  of 
these  motives  which  are  active  or  dor- 
mant in  his  mind.  He  cannot  know  to 
what  extent  the  particular  deeds  may 
affect  the  equation,  but  it  will  generally 
be  clear  to  him  whether  that  influence  is 
to  be  for  good  or  evil.  He  knows  it  to 
be  his  duty,  for  instance,  to  be  merciful 
and  helpful  to  his  fellow-men.  The  mo- 
tives of  his  conscience  alone  are  enough 
to  direct  his  conduct  in  such  matters. 
The  scientific  aspect  of  the  problem,  how- 
ever, may  well  add  reason  to  the  array  of 
impulses  which  lead  to  such  good  deeds. 
This  work  science  can  accomplish  by 
showing  how  each  action  serves  to  in- 


CONCLUSION.  99 

crease  the  effective  power  of  some  ances- 
tral or  recently  acquired  tendency,  thereby 
operating  to  magnify  a  power  which  helps 
in  the  higher  life.  Above  all  it  may  serve 
in  a  way  that  makes  for  profit  by  showing 
us  how  easily  though  insensibly  revolu- 
tions which  lead  to  good  or  evil  may  be 
brought  about  in  the  unseen  realm  where- 
in the  nature  of  the  individual  is  deter- 
mined. 

We  may  sum  up  the  considerations^ 
which  have  been  set  forth  in  the  forego- 
ing pages,  briefly  as  follows :  It  appears 
that  we  have  to  be  on  our  guard  lest  we 
extend  our  notions  of  continuity  in  the 
natural  world  beyond  the  point  where 
the  evidence  of  continuous  action  justifies 
the  conception.  The  notion  of  continu- 
ity of  causation  is  so  overwhelming  in  its 
magnitude  that  we  cannot  adopt  it  with- 
out danger  of  extending  it  far  beyond  the 
limits  of  proof.  We  need  to  check  the 
course  of  our  imagination  when  it  consid- 
ers this  problem  by  a  frequent  contem- 


IOO  CRITICAL  POINTS. 

plat  ion  of  the  facts  which  show  the  ex- 
istence of  revolution-bringing  conditions. 
These  critical  conditions  we  find  clearly 
manifested  to  us  in  the  inorganic  world, 
in  the  primary  revolutionary  actions  of 
matter,  and  in  the  more  complicated  sud- 
den changes  which  arise  from  the  inter- 
action of  these  primary  crises.  Viewed^ 
in  this  way,  the  physical  universe  is  seen 
to  be  a  field  in  which  phenomena,  though 
derived  from  preceding  actions,  occur,  in 
a  way,  spontaneously.  Turning  from  the 
physical  to  the  organic  world,  we  find 
something  like  the  same  interaction  of 
conditions  producing  also  critical  stages 
in  the  development  of  living  beings.  We 
can  best  understand  the  variations  in  the 
organic  realm  by  supposing  that  they  are 
in  part  due  to  interaction  of  impulses 
similar  to  those  which  we  clearly  trace  in 
the  more  visible  realm  of  organic  matter. 

In  the  field  of  human  conduct  we  also 
find  that  this  view  as  to  the  occurrence  of 
certain  changes  brought  about  through 


THE  COURSE  Oft 


the  cooperation  of  separately  developed 
impulses  appears  to  have  considerable  im- 
portance. The  evidence  goes  to  show  the 
existence  of  these  hidden  equations  among 
the  inherited  and  individually  acquired  ca- 
pacities, and  it  moreover  indicates  that  the 
changes  in  the  tide  of  impulse  which  regu- 
late conduct  may  thereby  be  suddenly 
brought  about.  Furthermore,  the  consid- 
eration of  the  moral  aspect  of  critical 
points  vastly  enhances  the  dignity  of 
every  act,  for  however  the  deed  may  van- 
ish in  the  great  world  of  phenomena  it 
substantially  remains  as  a  contribution  to 
the  motives  of  the  individual. 

Speaking  from  my  own  experience  alone, 
I  may  say  in  conclusion  that  by  dwelling 
on  these  considerations  we  may  attain  to 
a  view  concerning  the  course  of  nature 
which  differs  widely  from  that  which 
seems  to  be  held  by  most  naturalists. 
We  see  that  this  world,  though  moving 
onward  in  its  path  of  change  under  con- 
ditions which  are  determined  by  the  per- 


c        <;  a  ;C$I7VCAL  POINTS. 

sistence  of  energy  and  of  matter,  is  sub- 
ject to  endless  revolutionary  changes. 
These  crises  seem  to  be  arranged  in  a  cer- 
tain large  and  orderly  way.  The  minor 
of  them  occur  with  infinite  frequency,  ap- 
pearing in  every  combination  of  matter; 
the  greater  happen  but  rarely,  the  great- 
est only  from  age  to  age.  After  all,  the 
supreme  test  of  our  general  opinion  con- 
cerning the  material  world  is  the  satis- 
faction which  the  view  may  give  to  the 
beholder.  For  my  own  part  I  find  this 
rational  introduction  of  the  unexpected 
and  the  unforeseeable  into  the  conception 
of  nature  more  satisfying  than  the  purely 
mechanical  view  which  is  so  commonly 
held  by  my  brethren  in  science. 


CHAPTER  III. 

THE   PLACE    OF   ORGANIC   LIFE   IN    NATURE. 

IT  should  require  no  extended  argu- 
ment to  show  that  the  amplest  test  of  all 
learning  is  found  in  its  final  effect  on  the 
conduct  of  life. 

The  knowledge  which  we  may  gain  from 
the  universe  is  indeed  infinite  in  its  extent ; 
however  much  of  it  we  may  compass,  the 
sum  of  the  unknown  remains  unchanged. 
The  learning  which  has  already  been  won 
to  the  storehouses  of  scholars  vastly  tran- 
scends the  understanding  of  any  man,  and 
the  harvest  is  so  rapidly  increasing  that 
the  store  gained  in  any  decade  is  beyond 
the  comprehension  of  the  individual  stu- 
dent. While  we  may  not  seek  to  limit 
this  noble  work  of  men  of  science  who  are 
exploring  all  the  ways  of  nature  for  truths, 
—  for  it  is  beyond  our  power  to  determine 


104         ORGANIC  LIFE  Itf  NATURE. 

the  limitations  in  the  usefulness  of  that 
which  they  may  secure,  —  the  value  of  their 
acquisitions  to  their  kindred  must  in  the 
end  be  measured  by  the  effect  of  the 
learning  on  the  destiny  of  mankind.  As 
finite  beings  we  can  be  interested  only  in 
that  which  affects  ourselves.  If  we  be 
devotees  to  a  particular  branch  of  recon- 
dite learning,  the  most  abstruse  phenom- 
ena, things  which  are  utterly  remote  from 
the  relations  of  ordinary  men,  may  be  of 
vital  importance  to  us,  because  they  en- 
large our  conceptions  and  afford  the  pre- 
cious sense  of  conquest  from  the  unknown, 
which  is  one  of  the  most  soul-inspiring  of 
experiences ;  but  in  the  large  and  general 
life  of  the  world  they  may  be  trivialities, 
matters  which  are  properly  "caviare  to 
the  general." 

It  is  these  simple  and  just  considera- 
tions which  lead  many  educated  people  to 
look  upon  the  swift  advance  of  modern 
science  as  boding  little  good  to  the  higher 
intellectual  and  spiritual  interests  of  man- 


PHYSICAL  DISCOVERIES.  1 05 

kind.  They  see  in  these  gains  so  much 
of  material  profit,  so  much  that  contri- 
butes to  mere  physical  necessities  and 
comforts,  that  they  fear  for  the  integrity 
of  the  ancient  humanistic  learning  and 
devotion.  All  thoughtful  naturalists  hope 
to  show  that  while  the  substantial  advan- 
tages which  have  come  to  us  from  the 
exploration  of  nature  are  very  great,  so 
extensive  indeed  that  to  the  casual  on- 
looker they  conceal  all  the  moral  qualities 
which  they  contain,  there  is  behind  this 
veil  of  commonplace  affairs  much  which 
may  profoundly  influence  our  souls. 
When  the  almost  childlike  surprise  with 
which  we  look  upon  the  physical  discov- 
eries of  our  day  has  passed  away,  when 
we  cease  to  treat  these  truths  as  toys  or 
as  mere  garments  of  our  ordinary  life, 
when,  in  a  word,  we  are  sufficiently  famil- 
iar with  them  to  see  their  spiritual  mean- 
ing, then  alone  will  we  find  our  way  to 
the  higher  blessings  which  they  bring. 
Although  this  stage  of  the  relation  of 


IO6         ORGANIC  LIFE  IN  NATURE. 

science  to  culture  is  as  yet  in  great  part 
to  be  attained,  there  are  -certain  fields  in 
which  the  better  work  of  interpretation 
can  be  begun,  —  fields  from  which  we  may 
gather  some  forerunning  of  the  harvest, 
which  in  its  fullness  can  be  garnered  only 
by  those  who  come  after  our  time. 

It  is  in  the  realm  of  the  organic  world 
that  we  may  expect  to  win  the  most  that 
makes  for  moral  advancement ;  that  physi- 
cal realm  is  still,  in  a  certain  way,  remote 
from  our  finer  perceptions  ;  only  our 
grosser  senses  can  as  yet  seize  upon  its 
phenomena ;  there  is  majesty  and  beauty 
in  its  vistas,  but  the  ways  of  men  have  not 
yet  traversed  them.  It  is  otherwise  with 
the  realm  of  life,  which  we  now  see  to 
be  clearly  akin  to  our  own.  It  is  because 
we  now  recognize  this  kinship  and  view 
all  living  things  as  sharers  with  ourselves 
in  this  gift  of  sentiency,  this  capacity  to 
profit  by  experience,  this  privilege  of 
handing  on  a  bettered  life  to  the  ages 
which  are  to  be,  that  organic  beings  afford 


ESSENTIAL    UNITY  OF  LIFE.         IO/ 

a  surer  if  not  a  higher  teaching  than  does 
the  material  of  which  they  are  composed. 
Of  all  the  marvelous  gains  in  understand- 
ing which  this  century  has  afforded,  none 
other  is  destined  to  be  so  profitable  as 
this  conception  of  the  essential  unity  of 
life.  Through  this  view  the  history  of 
man  has  gained  a  vast  perspective ;  in 
place  of  an  arbitrary  beginning  of  our 
life  in  this  moment  of  time,  we  behold  an 
orderly  succession  which  extends  back  to 
the  inconceivably  remote  ages.  We  ap- 
pear to  ourselves  no  longer  as  unrelated 
beings  akin  to  similar  creatures  of  the 
earth  only  by  a  mysterious  connection 
with  an  inconceivable  supreme  power,  but 
germane  to  all  the  creatures  of  this  and 
vanished  ages  ;  each  animal  and  plant 
becomes  an  interpreter  of  our  life  and 
stands  ready  to  testify  as  to  the  laws  of 
our  body  or  our  mind. 

It  is  impossible  to  overestimate  the  in- 
fluence of  the  new-found  truth  on  the 
destiny  of  man.  It  will  require,  indeed, 


IO8         ORGANIC  LIFE  IN  NATURE. 

centuries  of  study  before  these  wilder- 
nesses of  facts  which  await  interpretation 
are  brought  to  order  and  applied  to  their 
fit  use  in  guiding  the  conduct  of  individ- 
uals and  of  societies.  Already  we  see 
the  effect  of  this  better  understanding  of 
human  nature  in  the  inquiries  concerning 
the  principles  of  heredity  which  are  now 
going  on,  and  which  promise  to  throw 
great  light  on  the  treatment  of  diseases, 
the  management  of  criminals,  and  the 
methods  of  educational  work.  The  effect 
of  the  wider  view  may  also  be  discovered 
in  the  studies  of  the  psychologists,  who 
are  now  free  to  consider  the  mind  of  man 
as  open  to  explanation  through  the  men- 
tal habits  and  experiences  of  our  lower 
kindred  among  the  brutes.  My  present 
aim  is  to  show  that  by  the  same  reference 
of  our  own  conditions  of  existence  to  the 
lower  life,  which  we  are  free  to  study  in 
the  records  of  past  ages  as  well  as  in  the 
multitudinous  beings  of  to-day,  we  may 
arrive  at  certain  general  conclusions  as  to 


BIRTH  AND  DEATH.  109 

the  nature  of  those  obligations  which  re- 
quire each  individual  to  tread  the  fatal 
round  from  the  mother's  womb  to  the 
grave. 

To  primitive  men  of  all  races  the  su- 
preme incidents  of  birth  and  death  have 
ever  been  mysteries  which  were  to  be  ex- 
plained only  by  including  them  under  the 
even  more  mysterious  class  of  decrees  of 
a  superior  power.  With  all  these  accounts 
of  the  origin  of  death  it  has  ever  remained 
to  men  a  violent  and  unreasonable  in- 
fringement of  their  personality.  It  has 
colored  all  their  views  of  this  world  and 
denied  them  access  to  the  true  light.  It 
has  often  led  them  to  believe  that  the 
universe  was  essentially  cruel.  Where 
they  have  found  consolation  in  their  fear 
and  affliction,  they  have  not  often  discov- 
ered it  in  the  nature  about  them,  but  in 
the  belief  in  some  powers  which  they  have 
conceived  to  be  acting  beyond  this  sphere ; 
some  strength  which  in  the  end  might  lift 
them  above  the  brutal  rule  of  these  des- 


IIO         ORGANIC  LIFE  IN  NATURE. 

pots  of  the  dust.  It  seems  to  me  that  an 
unprejudiced  inquiry  into  the  history  of 
birth  and  death,  or  in  other  words  into 
this  generational  order  of  the  organic 
world,  may  in  certain  ways  enlarge  our 
conceptions  concerning  the  place  of  these 
incidents  in  the  system  of  life,  and  there- 
by spiritualize  our  judgments  concerning 
them.  If  I  may  judge  of  others  by  myself 
this  better  understanding  will  do  much  to 
exalt  the  student's  conception  of  the  great 
machinery  of  the  universe,  which  by  its 
operation  lifts  his  body  for  a  moment  into 
the  light,  and  then  lets  it  fall  again  into 
the  lower  inanimate  realm. 

Taking  it  as  our  first  task  to  examine 
into  the  place  of  death  in  nature,  we  must 
ask  the  reader  at  the  outset  to  make  sure 
that  he  has  apprehended  in  a  general  way 
the  more  evident  features  which  separate 
organic  forms,  the  creatures  with  which 
we  have  mainly  to  deal,  from  the  array  of 
the  mineral  kingdom.  It  seemed  to  the 
ancient  naturalists  a  relatively  simple  mat- 


LIVING   THINGS.  Ill 

ter  to  define  the  living  thing  in  a  man- 
ner which  would  trenchantly  separate  it 
from  the  things  which  had  not  life.  The 
ability  to  move,  the  capacity  to  assimilate 
food,  the  power  of  generating  its  kind, 
have  all  been  selected  as  exclusive  charac- 
teristics of  living  things.  A  closer  study 
of  the  facts  has  made  it  impossible  any 
longer  to  regard  these  old  definitions  as 
sufficient.  It  has  been  found  that  finely 
divided  particles  of  many  substances  when 
suspended  in  a  fluid  will,  under  the  influ- 
ence of  some  forces  as  yet  not  well  under- 
stood, take  on  an  incessant  movement.  So 
perfectly  does  this  motion  resemble  that 
of  some  of  the  microscopic  forms  of  the 
lower  simple  organisms,  that  naturalists 
at  first  supposed  that  in  observing  these 
movements  they  were  dealing  with  living 
beings.  The  crystals  of  the  rocks  per- 
form functions  which  were  once  supposed 
to  be  peculiar  to  animals  and  plants  ;  they 
undergo  changes  in  their  constitution, 
often  taking  in  new  materials,  which  they 


112         ORGANIC  LIFE  IN  NATURE. 

sometimes  decompose  into  their  elements 
and  rebuild  in  the  new  growth.  So,  too, 
crystals  are  in  a  way  capable  of  multiply- 
ing themselves,  for  when  one  begins  to 
form,  others  of  the  same  species,  as  it 
were,  sprout  from  it,  much  in  the  manner 
of  certain  lowly  forms  which  are  certainly 
alive.  In  truth,  we  can  no  longer  main- 
tain the  existence  of  a  clear  physical  dif- 
ference between  the  organic  and  the  inor- 
ganic world,  and  must  regard  these  realms 
as  divided  from  each  other  by  features 
which  when  measured  in  a  formal  way 
are  most  unsubstantial. 

Looking  at  the  organization  of  the 
physical  universe,  and  seeking  to  learn 
the  nature  of  its  divisions,  we  readily  per- 
ceive that  the  material  parts,  the  chemical 
substances  in  whose  varied  forms  matter 
presents  itself  to  us,  tend  ever  to  take  on 
individual  shapes,  and  to  exercise  specific 
functions.  From  the  primitive  condition 
of  diffused  nebulous  material,  where  the 
only  definite  structures  were  the  ultimate 


A  GGRE  GA  TION  OF  MA  TTER.         113 

atoms  of  which  the  mass  was  composed, 
matter  hastens  ever  towards  aggregations 
of  diverse  natures  :  falling  together  into 
centres  of  union,  they  evolve  the  solar  sys- 
tems, the  fixed  stars  of  space  with  their 
attendant  planetary  spheres.  In  each  of 
these  bodies  or  aggregations  matter  devel- 
ops other  groups  of  individualities ;  the 
atoms  combine  in  more  and  more  compli- 
cated associations,  and  these  from  time  to 
time  associate  themselves  in  regular  geo- 
metric shapes  as  crystals,  or  in  less  defi- 
nite forms  as  concretions.  In  all  of  these 
associations  we  have  a  certain  measure  of 
action  which  is  indistinguishable  from  that 
which  takes  place  in  the  organic  forms. 
These  aggregations  of  matter  grow  to  de- 
finite shapes  ;  they  have  a  show  of  func- 
tions, they  sometimes  appear  to  breed 
their  kind,  and  they  often  perish  after  a 
more  or  less  lengthened  though  indeter- 
minate period  of  existence.  Finally,  this 
struggle  for  advance  out  of  the  primal 
confusion  of  material  things  leads  to  the 


114         ORGANIC  LIFE  IN  NATURE. 

creation  of  that  last-formed  and  highest 
state  of  association  of  materials  with 
which  we  have  as  yet  become  acquainted, 
the  forms  we  term  "  living." 

To  the  eye  of  the  philosophical  ob- 
server, organic  things  appear  as  the  con- 
summation of  an  effort  towards  organi- 
zation which  has  pervaded  the  universe 
since  the  earliest  stages  of  which  we  can 
have  any  conception.  As  we  advance  in 
the  steps  of  this  great  on-going,  we  find 
that  the  fields  in  which  the  augmenting 
successes  are  attained  ever  become  more 
limited  in  their  conditions.  The  forma- 
tion of  matter  in  the  celestial  spheres  is 
the  most  universal  and  complete  of  all 
these  processes  of  organizing  nature. 
Nearly  the  whole  of  the  visible  universe 
has  thus  been  cast  into  the  spheroidal 
shape,  there  being  only  here  and  there 
masses  which  retain  the  nebulous  form, 
and  the  greater  part  of  these  are  evi- 
dently converging  towards  the  next  state 
of  organization.  The  molecular  order  of 


LIMIT  A  TIONS.  1 1 5 

grouping  in  the  atoms  is  also  far  advanced 
throughout  the  visible  universe.  The  crys- 
talline state  has  been  instituted  in  certain 
portions  of  the  earth's  crust,  and  probably 
in  the  outer  parts  at  least  of  several  other 
planets  in  this  solar  system,  and  may  in- 
deed be  a  common  feature  in  the  similar 
bodies  which  we  with  reason  believe  to 
exist  about  the  other  suns.  The  whole 
of  these  solar  centres,  the  central  portions 
of  the  planets,  and  perhaps  of  the  whole  of 
the  lesser  satellites  which  attend  them,  in 
all  probability  at  least  nine  hundred  and 
ninety-nine  one  thousandths  of  the  mate- 
rial world,  remain  so  far  heated  that  the 
forces  which  lead  to  organization  have  not 
as  yet  been  able  to  bring  the  substances 
into  the  crystalline  form.  Although  the 
crystal-making  energies  are  as  yet  in- 
effective in  all  save  a  small  part  of  the 
matter  of  the  spheres,  the  domain  of  the 
organic  processes  measured  by  the  field 
it  occupies  is  infinitely  less  manifested. 
Looking  at  this  vast  assemblage  of  or- 


II 6        ORGANIC  LIFE  IN  NATURE. 

ganic  forms  which  on  this  earth  at  present 
contains  not  less  than  a  million  species, 
beholding  these  forms  occupying  nearly 
every  available  point  on  the  earth's  sur- 
face, the  spaces  of  the  air,  the  depths  of 
the  sea,  the  darkness  of  the  caverns,  even 
the  surfaces  of  the  snow -fields,  it  may 
seem  to  the  observer  that  life  is  endowed 
with  the  power  to  maintain  itself  under  a 
great  variety  of  conditions ;  but  when  we 
consider  the  extent  of  that  dot  in  space, 
our  solar  system,  and  compare  its  area  and 
its  mass  with  the  field  occupied  by  animals 
and  plants,  we  see  how  truly  insignificant 
are  the  dimensions  in  which  life  finds  a 
dwelling-place. 

Life  as  we  know  it  depends  upon  condi- 
tions so  limited  in  their  nature  that  it 
seems  almost  a  miracle  that  it  exists  at  all. 
So  narrow  is  the  way  this  higher  organiza- 
tion has  to  tread  that  we  must  marvel  that 
it  ever  found  its  way  into  being.  The  exis- 
tence of  all  organic  forms  depends  in  the 
first  place  upon  the  maintenance  on  the 


TEMPERA  TURE.  1 1  / 

earth,  during  at  least  a  part  of  the  year,  of 
a  temperature  which  does  not  fall  below 
the  freezing  point  or  rise  much  above  100° 
Fahr.  The  range  of  heat  which  life  can 
sustain  may  be  taken  as  less  than  100  °  ; 
but  in  the  sun  we  have  a  temperature 
which  cannot  well  be  estimated  as  less 
than  100,000°  Fahr.,  and  in  the  depths  of 
the  earth  is  probably  to  be  measured  by 
tens  of  thousands  of  degrees  on  that  scale, 
while  in  the  realm  of  ether  between  the 
solar  and  terrestrial  spheres  there  is  a 
degree  of  cold  which  is  certainly  to  be 
reckoned  as  some  hundreds  of  degrees 
below  zero.  Amid  these  contending  ex- 
tremes of  heat  and  cold  life  must  find  its 
narrow  place.  It  happens  by  a  combina- 
tion of  circumstances,  which,  if  a  matter  of 
pure  fortuity,  must  have  been  a  most  rare 
chance,  that  on  the  surface  of  the  earth 
the  proper  conditions  were  secured  in  a 
very  ancient  day.  Since  the  beginning  of 
the  geological  record  there  has  probably 
never  been  a  time  when  at  the  height  of 


ORGANIC  LIFE  IN  NATURE. 

six  miles  above  the  earth's  surface,  even 
over  the  equator,  the  temperature  neces- 
sary for  the  life  of  animals  and  plants  has 
existed,  and  in  all  these  ages  the  death- 
dealing  level  of  cold  has  probably  lain  much 
nearer  the  surface  in  all  high  latitudes. 
Beneath  the  surface  of  the  earth,  life  does 
not  exist  except  in  the  crevices  of  the  soil 
and  in  the  chambers  of  caverns ;  and  even 
in  this  subterranean  realm  it  attains  only 
a  lowly  estate  and  could  not  be  preserved 
save  for  the  contributions  of  food  derived 
from  the  sun-lit  realm. 

Being  in  an  essential  way  the  product 
of  solar  irradiation,  of  which  the  field  it 
occupies  must  receive  definite  and  very  ac- 
curately measured  quantities,  organic  life 
is  necessarily  limited  to  the  surface  of 
those  planets,  where  a  temperature  a  little 
above  the  freezing  and  below  the  boiling 
point  of  water  is  maintained.  Few  of 
those  spheres  of  our  solar  system  can 
present  the  conditions  which  permit  mat- 
ter to  rise  to  this  highest  form  of  aggre- 
gation in  animals  and  plants. 


PLANETARY  LIFE.  1 19 

The  planet  Mercury  from  its  nearness 
to  the  sun  must  have  a  temperature  too 
high  for  these  delicate  forms.    Even  Venus, 
though  much  more  remote  from  the  solar 
centre,  probably  has  a  degree  of  heat  mak- 
ing its  climatal  conditions  almost  impossi- 
ble for  life.    Beyond  the  orbit  of  the  earth 
the  power  of  the  sun's  rays  to  maintain 
sufficient  warmth  rapidly  diminishes.    Mars 
seems  to  be  the  only  one  of  the  exterior 
planets  which  can  have  living  tenants,  and 
even  there  it  is  hardly  to  be  believed  that 
life  can  exist.     As  to  the  status   of  the 
planetary    bodies    which    probably   circle 
around  the  fixed  stars,  we  are  not  only 
uninformed,  but  seem  debarred  from  all 
chance  of  knowledge.     As  a  basis -of  con- 
jecture as  to  the  condition  of  the  innumer- 
able minor  spheres  of  space,  we  have  only 
the  simple  facts   revealed  to  us   by  the 
spectroscope,  which  tells  us  something  as 
to  the  chemical  nature  of  the  matter  con- 
tained in  those  stellar  masses.     This  in- 
formation is  clearly  to  the  effect  that  their 


I2O          ORGANIC  LIFE  IN  NATURE. 

chemical  constitution  is  the  same  as  that 
of  our  own  sphere.  The  telescope,  more- 
over, shows  by  the  facts  concerning  the 
nebulae  it  discloses,  that  the  law  of  organ- 
ization, by  virtue  of  which  matter  takes  on 
its  shape  in  those  remote  suns,  is  the  same 
as  that  which  determines  the  form  of  our 
own  celestial  family ;  it  is  therefore  a  fair 
presumption  that  planets  are  a  common 
feature  in  the  universe.  This,  even 
though  it  may  be  inspiring  to  the  imagi- 
nation, leads  to  no  other  definite  conclu- 
sion than  that  to  which  we  attain  from  the 
study  of  our  own  planetary  spheres.  This 
is  in  effect  as  follows :  organic  life  is  neces- 
sarily limited  to  an  almost  inconceivably 
small  part  of  the  space  and  the  mass  of 
the  visible  universe. 

A  similar  consideration  as  to  the  portion 
of  the  materials  of  the  universe  which 
have  won  their  way  to  the  organic  state 
will  show  us  that  the  share  which  this  liv- 
ing impulse  has  in  the  mass  of  matter  is 
as  limited  as  its  measure  of  extension.  At 


LIMIT  A  TION  IN  MASS.  121 

the  present  moment  the  living  beings  of 
all  kinds  on  the  earth  do  not  altogether 
amount  to  more  than  would  form  a  thin 
sheet  if  they  were  evenly  spread  out  upon 
its  surface.  If  we  could  reduce  all  these 
living  forms  to  such  a  sheet,  it  would  prob- 
ably be  less  than  a  foot  in  thickness  over 
the  surface  of  this  sphere,  or  somewhere 
near  one  ten-millionth  part  of  the  whole 
mass.  It  is  not  likely  that  at  any  time 
since  life  came  into  existence  it  has  ever 
lifted  more  than  some  such  infinitesimal 
portion  of  the  mass  to  the  organic  state. 
Trifling  as  is  this  proportion  of  living 
matter  to  that  which  abides  in  the  lower 
physical  condition,  v;e  must  yet  further 
diminish  its  proportion  to  the  body  of 
the  visible  universe  by  the  consideration 
that  the  sun  and  the  greater  part  of  the 
planets  and  their  attendant  satellites,  as 
well  as  all  the  vast  realm  of  the  ethereal 
spaces,  are  utterly  beyond  the  possibility 
of  organic  existence. 

We  should  go  yet  further,  and  note  that 


122         ORGANIC  LIFE  IN  NATURE. 

in  time  the  place  of  life  is  limited  as  it  is 
in  space  and  mass.  Although  the  period 
during  which  life  has  endured  on  this  earth 
is  great  beyond  comprehension,  —  it  cannot 
indeed  well  be  less  than  100,000,000  years, 
—  its  duration  is  but  as  an  instant  when 
compared  with  the  ages  through  which 
the  material  universe  has  endured.  Be- 
yond this  period  of  life  lie  dim  ages  during 
which  the  concentration  of  matter  from 
the  state  of  nebulous  dispersion  into  the 
solar  system  was  brought  about,  and  yet 
other  ages  in  which  this  globe  was  cooling 
from  its  original  very  heated  state  to  that 
in  which  its  surface  became  fit  for  tenancy 
by  animals  and  plants.  It  may  be  that  one 
hundred  or  one  thousand  times  the  vital 
period  was  required  for  the  accomplish- 
ment of  these  processes  which  led  to  the 
formation  of  our  solar  system.  Thus  tak- 
ing no  account  of  the  infinite  past  which 
elapsed  before  the  aggregation  of  the 
spheres  was  begun,  or  of  the  infinite  future 
after  the  sun's  heat  shall  have  been  so  far 


LIMITATION  IN  TIME.  12$ 

diminished  that  living  beings  can  no 
longer  endure,  we  behold  that  these  no- 
blest forms  of  existence  are  limited  to 
what  we  may  fairly  term  a  moment  of 
time. 

This  glance  at  the  larger  circumstances 
of  organic  life,  though  but  superficial, 
shows  us  very  clearly  that,  measured  .in 
terms  of  space,  time,  and  mass,  this  form 
of  being  has  an  inconceivably  small  place 
in  the  universe.  If  we  should  reckon  its 
importance  solely  by  these  tests,  we  should 
be  justified  in  ranking  it  as  a  trifling  and 
temporary  incident  in  the  march  of  the 
greater  inanimate  nature.  It  is  impossi- 
ble, indeed,  for  the  first  time  to  contem- 
plate these  limitations  of  that  form  of 
existence  to  which  we  ourselves  belong 
without  being  appalled  at  the  physical 
conditions  of  all  our  kind.  The  ancients 
in  their  more  solemn  hours  were  stricken 
with  dismay  when  they  considered  the 
place  which  the  individual  man  had  in  this 
ample  nature ;  but  it  is  left  to  us  in  the 


124        ORGANIC  LIFE  IN  NATURE. 

modern  day  so  to  extend  the  perspectives 
of  the  universe  that  not  only  the  race 
of  man  but  all  the  assemblage  of  living 
beings  appear  to  be  more  the  creatures 
of  the  moment  than  our  forefathers  con- 
ceived the  most  ephemeral  insect  to  be. 
Awful  as  is  this  conception  of  the  universe 
which  modern  science,  by  breaking  down 
the  comfortable  prison  of  ancient  belief, 
has  opened  to  us,  it  is  not  likely  that  it 
will  long  affright  mankind.  At  the  mo- 
ment of  surprise  we  are  like  the  wayfarer 
who,  wandering  over  some  flowery  upland, 
comes  unexpectedly  to  the  edge  of  a  great 
precipice.  For  the  instant  his  mind  is 
overwhelmed  by  the  profound  depths  be- 
fore him,  but  when  his  eyes  become  accus- 
tomed to  the  scene  his  senses  go  forth 
again,  and  he  sees  that  the  depth  is  still  a 
part  of  his  own  beautiful  world. 

Many  persons,  when  they  come  for  the 
first  time  to  consider  these  great  concep- 
tions of  the  place  of  life  in  nature,  or  even 
that  small  part  of  the  view  which  concerns 


MAWS  PLACE  IN  NATURE.  12$ 

the  position  which  they  individually  or 
their  race  really  occupies,  are,  in  the  tu- 
mult of  soul  which  the  revelation  induces, 
impelled  to  a  revolt  against  the  universe. 
Some  of  the  largest  and  gentlest  of  men, 
who  have  been  nurtured  in  the  languid  and 
rather  enervating  air  of  purely  humanized 
interests,  look  upon  this  physical  infinite 
as  a  vast  and  terrible  engine  moving  with 
relentless  and  merciless  energy  over  the 
tender  forms  of  those  creatures  which, 
cursed  with  sentiency,  are  doomed  to  be 
crushed  beneath  its  wheels.  There  can 
be  no  question  that  this  is  a  very  natural 
first  view  as  to  man's  place  in  nature  ;  of 
the  place,  indeed,  in  which  all  life  belongs. 
If  it  were  the  final  view  of  those  relations, 
even  the  dearest  lovers  of  the  truth  might 
well  doubt  the  good  of  our  better  know- 
ledge. They  might  be  tempted  to  believe 
that  it  would  have  been  better  to  have 
stayed  in  the  world  of  fiction  than  to  have 
been  forced  to  face  such  realities.  But  all 
that  there  is  of  gloom  in  this  vista  which 


126         ORGANIC  LIFE  IN  NATURE. 

modern  knowledge  opens  to  us  comes 
from  within  ourselves.  It  is  due  to  the 
false  attitude  which  old  beliefs  as  to  the 
position  of  man  in  nature  have  engendered 
in  us.  For  ages  the  trend  of  the  common 
thinking,  indeed  of  the  greater  part  of  phi- 
losophical speculation  and  of  nearly  all 
religious  teaching,  has  been  directed  as 
if  to  the  end  of  setting  man  apart  from 
and  against  nature.  So  effective  has  this 
teaching  been  that  the  separation  of  the 
human  spirit  from  the  environing  world 
is  almost  complete.  In  this,  their  very 
cradle,  men  have  been  taught  to  look 
upon  themselves  as  in  a  prison  ;  they 
have  considered  the  vast  machinery  of 
the  material  universe  which  has  brought 
them  into  being  as  something  alien  to 
their  better  selves,  as  a  realm  to  be  es- 
caped from  through  the  gates  of  death. 

It  is  by  no  means  difficult  to  see  how 
this  singular  attitude  of  man  to  his  imme- 
diate master,  the  material  world,  has  come 
to  be.  To  obtain  a  clear  understanding  as 


SELF-CONSCIO  USNESS..  1 2? 

to  the  way  in  which  our  present  view  has 
been  forced  upon  us,  it  is  important  that 
we  now  turn  aside  for  the  moment  to  con- 
sider its  genesis.  While  our  life  was  in 
the  keeping  of  the  creatures  below  th<* 
level  of  man,  the  reconciliation  with  na 
ture  was  essentially  complete,  as  it  is  be- 
tween the  spheres  of  our  solar  system  or 
the  atoms  of  which  they  are  composed ; 
but  as  the  advancing  beings  in  our  ances- 
tral line  began  to  do  more  and  more  diffi- 
cult tasks,  deeds  requiring  ever  a  greater 
share  of  thought,  they  were  compelled 
little  by  little  to  take  themselves  into  ac- 
count.  As  long  as  actions  were  instinc- 
tive, even  if  they  were  movements  such 
as  those  we  make  in  fencing,  or  in  any 
other  well-learned  tasks  which  are  familiar 
to  an  animal  or  a  man,  the  sense  of  self 
did  not  have  to  be  awakened  in  their  ex- 
ecution, for  the  being  acts  in  an  auto- 
matic manner.  When,  however,  the  thing 
to  be  done  requires  forethought,  and  in 
the  measure  of  the  fore-thinking  a  self- 


128         ORGANIC  LIFE  IN  NATURE. 

hood  is  aroused,  a  great  change  comes 
over  the  conditions  of  life.  With  this 
change  to  consciousness  in  action  men 
find  that  they  are  set  over  and  against  na- 
ture in  their  efforts  to  wring  their  grati- 
fication from  a  rather  unyielding  world. 
Generation  by  generation  this  antagonism 
increases,  until  man  becomes  what  we  now 
find  him,  a  self-seer  and  a  self-seeker,  his 
personality  grown  beyond  all  account,  and 
all  the  capacities  which  it  can  master  ar- 
raigned in  combat  with  the  world  about 
him.  To  this  anomalous  being  there  is 
a  simple  twofold  division  of  the  universe, 
himself  on  one  side  and  all  else  on  the 
other.  The  classification,  though  prepos- 
terous, is  perfectly  natural  and  marks  a 
stage  in  his  moral  and  spiritual  develop- 
ment. 

Almost  as  soon  as  our  ancestors  found 
their  way  to  this  strange  knowledge  of 
themselves  which  self-consciousness  gives, 
and  began  their  long  war  with  the  world 
about  them,  making  of  all  else  an  age- 


MAN'S  LONELINESS.  129 

long  enemy,  the  peculiar  loneliness  of  their 
situation  began  to  be  apparent  to  man. 
The  love  of  kindred  inherited  from  the 
lower  life,  though  it  might  assuage,  could 
not  cure  this  hunger  for  a  union  with  eter- 
nal things.  At  first,  perhaps  altogether 
and  ever  in  large  part,  this  impulse  towards 
a  friendly  relation  with  some  assuring  per- 
manence came  from  fear,  —  fear  of  that 
dark  and  mysterious  realm,  the  world  of 
phenomena,  from  which  he  was  in  endur- 
ing peril,  and  which  in  the  end  was  sure 
to  overcome  him.  It  was  impossible  for 
him  to  turn  to  this  environing  nature  for 
consolation,  for  it  seemed  his  implacable 
enemy.  The  only  way  open  to  him  was 
through  his  imagination,  which  led  him 
to  conceive  a  realm  beyond  the  natural, 
which  he  filled  with  friendly  or  at  least 
with  propitiable  beings,  strong  enough  to 
give  him  some  aid  in  the  path  of  life,  and 
willing  to  lift  him  to  their  more  exalted 
sphere  when  the  fight  was  over.  These 
gods  and  the  place  in  which  they  abode 


I3O         ORGANIC  LIFE  IN  NATURE. 

were  conceived  as,  foreign  to  the  every- 
day world,  comfortably  beyond  its  inimical 
realm  of  familiar  material  things.  In  a 
half-conceived  way  these  overruling  pow- 
ers were  supposed  to  exercise  a  kind  of 
sovereignty  over  the  ruder  forces  of  the 
universe.  Their  world  was  a  better  world 
than  this,  but  it  was  too  much  to  believe 
that  they  had  entirely  escaped  from  the 
arch-enemy,  matter.  Gradually,  with  the 
advance  in  intellectual  power,  with  the  ac- 
cumulated store  of  possessions,  this  con- 
ception of  a  blessed  alien  realm  became 
with  certain  peoples  so  adorned,  so  mag- 
nificent, so  captivating,  that  by  the  very 
multitude  and  array  of  its  fictions  it  be- 
came very  real  to  their  minds.  When 
this  dual  view  of  man's  place  in  nature 
was  completed  as  far  as  his  mind  could 
affect  its  shape,  by  slow  going  and  at  first 
slight  beginnings,  now  here,  now  there, 
but  altogether  among  the  men  of  our 
own  Aryan  race,  students  began  to  satisfy 
their  curiosity  concerning  the  phenomenal 


PURE  STUDY  OF  NATURE.          131 

world  by  closely  observing  its  effects.  At 
first  these  inquiries  were  clouded  by  super- 
natural conceptions.  The  Greeks  alone 
among  the  ancients  succeeded  in  separat- 
ing the  facts  from  their  religious  belief, 
and  thereby  they  instituted  the  first  pure 
study  of  nature.  With  the  extension  of 
the  Roman  spirit  in  Pagan  and  early 
Christian  days  the  spirit  of  natural  in- 
quiry was  lost,  and  it  was  not  entirely 
revived  until  just  after  the  overthrow  of 
Byzantium  by  the  Turks  in  1452.  This 
historic  event  led  to  the  migration  of 
Greek  scholars  to  western  Europe,  and 
especially  to  northern  Italy.  With  them 
they  brought  what  remained  in  their  pos- 
session of  the  manuscripts  which  con- 
tained the  records  of  Greek  science. 
Other  fragments  of  this  learning  —  per- 
haps even  more  valuable,  for  they  had 
been  treasured  by  their  keepers  for  some 
centuries  —  came  to  western  Europe  from 
the  Arabian  followers  of  Mahomet.  These 
seeds  from  the  ancient  naturalism  did  not 


132         ORGANIC  LIFE  IN  NATURE. 

fall  on  stony  ground;  they  came  upon  a 
fertile  soil,  where  they  grew  apace.  The 
arts  of  architecture,  painting,  and  sculp- 
ture, and  the  study  of  human  anatomy  had 
done  much  to  prepare  the  mind  of  man 
for  a  living  contact  with  the  phenomenal 
world. 

Since  the  beginning  of  the  sixteenth 
century  the  growth  of  this  modern  recon- 
ciliation of  the  human  mind  with  nature 
has  gone  forward  with  great  rapidity. 
Only  in  the  best  ages  of  Grecian  learn- 
ing, when  that  hive  of  thought  was  most 
active,  do  we  find  anything  like  this 
gain  in  naturalistic  motives.  Despite  the 
sturdy  and  well-directed  opposition  of  the 
Roman  Church,  the  glow  of  the  new 
learning,  arising  among  the  separate  peo- 
ples of  Italy,  France,  Germany,  and  Eng- 
land, has  grown  to  a  great  light  which 
illuminates  the  way  of  man.  Before  it  the 
shadowy,  because  imaginary,  world  is  fad- 
ing away.  Day  by  day  men  are  more 
clearly  perceiving  that  the  ancient  hostile 


THE  NEW  LEARNING.  133 

attitude  towards  the  material  universe  was 
the  greatest  of  the  many  errors  of  their  in- 
tellectual infancy ;  one  which  it  is  their 
first  duty  to  set  aright.  In  this  correc- 
tion of  the  great  primitive  blunder  the 
naturalists  seem  to  the  supernaturalists  to 
be  doing  a  cruel  work.  It  is  not  a  matter 
of  surprise  that  in  this  overturning  there 
should  be  a  great  deal  of  heart-burning 
and  much  distress  brought  about.  It  is 
easy,  however,  for  the  calmer  spirits  to 
see  that  the  cause  of  truth  will  not  suffer 
by  the  change,  and  that  the  best  of  the 
old  view  will  be  preserved  in  the  new. 
There  is  room  in  the  actual  universe  for 
all  the  good  which  the  ideals  of  man  have 
ever  contained.  There  is  on  earth  a 
firmer  foundation  for  heaven  than  it  has 
had  before. 

Thus  we  see  that  the  existing  attitude 
of  half -fear,  half -trust  which  men  hold  to 
the  material  world  is  explained  by  their 
history  and  their  mental  development. 
The  fear  represents  the  remains  of  the 


134         ORGANIC  LIFE  IN  NATURE. 

immemorial  terror  derived  from  man's  old 
attitude  towards  the  nature  about  him, 
which  he  conceived  to  be  his  enemy  ;  the 
trust  arises  from  the  new  sense  of  the 
order,  the  majesty,  the  immense  purpose- 
„  fulness  of  the  material  universe.  Man 
has  not  yet  learned  to  feel  that  his  heaven 
is  to  be  made  in  the  world  about  his  door ; 
it  is  hard  for  him  to  change  the  habits 
of  thought  which  millenniums  have  bred 
in  him,  and  which  are  embodied  in  the 
mightiest  traditions  of  his  race.  It  may 
yet  require  centuries  to  effect  this  great 
and  momentous  change,  to  turn  into  the 
fields  of  his  daily  life  the  tide  of  hope 
and  love  which  had  gone  into  the  barren 
realm  of  the  imagined  supernatural.  It 
is,  however,  clear  to  all  those  who  believe 
that  naturalism  is  to  replace  supernatural- 
ism  that  this  end  should  be  speedily  and 
effectively  attained  ;  first,  in  order  that  the 
transition  should  be  effected  as  rapidly 
and  clearly  as  possible,  and  second,  that 
the  measure  of  the  necessary  change 


PERILS  OF  TRANSITION.  135 

should  not  be  overlooked.  All  the  true 
advocates  of  the  natural  view  of  man's 
relations  should  do  what  in  them  lies  to 
secure  these  results,  for  on  them  depends 
the  avoidance  of  many  dangers. 

The  greatest  peril  which  may  be  en- 
countered in  this  transition  will  be  found 
in  the  destruction  of  the  old  ideals  be- 
fore the  new  have  been  established.  At 
present  the  old  implicit  confidence  in  the 
supernatural  is  in  good  part  shaken.  The 
moral  standards  which  that  trust  upheld 
are  imperfectly  supported,  and  there  is  a 
certain  amount  of  risk  that  the  ancient 
control  over  the  conduct  of  life  may  be 
lost  before  the  new  sense  of  obligation  is 
insured.  As  I  shall  try  to  show  hereafter, 
the  admonitions  of  right  doing  and  the 
denunciations  of  evil  conduct  which  come 
to  us  from  the  world  of  fact  are  as  manda- 
tory as  any  which  have  been  delivered  to 
men  from  the  supernatural  realm.  But  the 
voice  of  nature  can  be  heard  only  by  those 
whose  ears  are  attuned  thereto,  while  blind 
faith  has  a  place  in  all  men. 


136         ORGANIC  LIFE  IN  NATURE. 

There  is  reason  to  fear  that  men  are 
being  led  to  abandon  the  old  trust  in  tra- 
dition before  they  have  any  confidence 
in  or  indeed  any  knowledge  of  the  other 
teaching. 

The  other  and  perhaps  equally  serious 
risk  is  seen  in  the  hasty  conclusion  often 
expressed  by  religious-minded  people,  that 
naturalism  inevitably  means  the  overthrow 
of  all  faith  in  things  unseen;  that  those 
who  love  and  trust  the  visible  universe  are 
committed  to  base  and  carnal  views,  and 
that  they  give  no  place  to  things  beyond 
the  touch  of  hand  and  sight  of  eye.  This 
judgment  of  naturalism,  though  it  doubt- 
less finds  a  certain  justification  in  the  atti- 
tude of  many  narrow-minded  persons  who 
deem  themselves  true  students  of  nature, 
is  nevertheless  unjustifiable.  Whoever 
deals  with  a  realm  of  the  actual  in  a  proper 
way  finds  himself  persuaded  that  he  has  to 
do  with  the  infinite ;  he  keenly  feels  that 
what  he  or  his  kind  can  ever  learn  from  it 
is  as  nothing  to  that  which  must  remain  un- 


WHAT  NATURALISM  MEANS.        137 

known.  He,  the  naturalist,  differs  from  the 
supernaturalist  not  in  the  lesser  measure  of 
his  willingness  to  postulate  the  existence 
of  many  things  which  elude  his  senses, 
armed  though  he  may  be  with  skill  and  in- 
struments to  aid  his  powers,  but  by  his  be- 
lief, based  on  what  he  knows  in  the  ways  of 
experience,  that  there  is  but  one  kingdom, 
one  order,  and  one  control  in  the  universe. 
He  objects  to  the  conception  of  a  supernal 
realm  separated  in  its  character  from  the 
lower  world  ;  moreover,  he  questions  the 
trustworthiness  of  the  view,  fundamental 
in  many  religions,  which  holds  to  the  ex- 
istence of  a  dual  principle  of  good  and  evil 
throughout  nature.  Beyond  these  impor- 
tant differences  as  to  primal  concepts  there 
is  really  little  of  moment  to  separate  the 
men  who  approach  the  unknown  through 
the  old  ways  of  the  imagination  and  those 
who  find  their  path  into  the  depths  from 
the  newer  avenues  of  science.  It  cannot 
be  denied  that  the  differences  in  methods 
are  to  a  certain  extent  radical,  but  the  re- 


138         ORGANIC  LIFE  IN  NATURE. 

suits  obtained  may  not  be  far  apart.  The 
moral  interpretation  of  the  universe,  which 
is  the  essence  of  religion,  will  be  accom- 
plished as  well  by  the  priests  who  go  with 
the  naturalist  to  the  verge  of  the  fields 
which  have  been  won  by  science  as  it  has 
been  in  the  past  by  the  purely  imaginative 
method.  The  difference  will  exist  in  the 
acceptance,  on  the  part  of  all  inquirers, 
of  the  unity,  trustworthiness,  and  teaching 
value  of  material  things. 

There  is  abundant  room  for  spiritual 
truths  in  the  universe.  In  fact,  our  mod- 
ern physical  science  is  ever  tending  away 
from  the  crude  conceptions  of  matter  held 
by  the  ancients.  It  seems  now  as  if  the 
end  of  the  long  dispute  between  the  mate- 
rialists and  the  spiritualists  may  soon  come 
about  through  the  growing  conviftion  of 
physicists  that  all  matter  is  but  a  mode  of 
action  of  energy  ;  that  the  physical  uni- 
verse is  not  a  congeries  of  atoms,  which 
are  inert  except  when  stirred  by  the  dy- 
namic powers;  that  all  phenomena  whatever 


THE    TWO  SCHOOLS.  139 

are  but  manifestations  of  power.  In  other 
words,  the  students  of  nature  are  now 
nearer  to  those  who  have  trusted  for  guid- 
ance to  the  divining  sense  than  ever  be- 
fore. The  only  thing  which  really  divides 
their  motives  is  the  shadow  of  the  old 
fear  of  the  tangible  world,  which  came 
into  existence  in  the  earlier  combats  of 
man  with  his  environment. 

It  seems  to  me  of  the  utmost  importance 
that  all  those  who  perceive  the  necessity 
of  conjoining  the  two  methods  of  inter- 
preting nature  should  use  their  best  efforts 
to  clear  away  this  old,  unnatural,  yet  most 
historic  division  which  parts  the  thought- 
ful men  of  our  time.  The  way  to  accom- 
plish this  end  is  not  clear.  While  we  may 
trust  much  to  the  course  of  nature,  to  the 
trends  of  thought  which  are  insensibly  and 
yet  urgently  driving  philosophical  minds 
into  a  sense  that  the  field  of  their  inqui- 
ries has  no  boundaries,  we  may  also  effect 
something  by  a  deliberate  consideration 
of  the  nature  of  this  ideal  division.  It  is 


I4O         ORGANIC  LIFE  IN  NATURE. 

manifest  that  the  real  difficulty,  however, 
consists  in  the  nature  of  the  evidence  on 
which  the  two  schools  base  their  work. 
The  naturalist  rests  his  conclusions  on 
facts  which  are  or  may  be  known  to  all 
men  whatsoever ;  the  supernaturalist  rests 
his  contention  on  observations  which  are 
patent  only  to  a  particular  class  of  per- 
sons. So  far  as  religion  bares  its  doctrines 
on  the  hypothesis  that  events  in  the  nat- 
ural world  occur  outside  of  the  realm  of 
law,  there  seems  at  present  no  prospect 
of  a  real  reconciliation  between  these 
views.  So  far  as  religion  is  founded  or 
may  be  made  to  rest  on  phenomena  of 
man's  moral  nature  and  on  the  sense  of 
the  depth  of  the  universe,  the  limitless 
possibility  of  its  conditions,  we  are  entitled 
to  expect  a  substantial  unity  between  these 
two  schools  of  interpreters. 

Even  in  the  matter  of  miracles  it  seems 
not  improbable  that  science  is  likely  to 
come  nearer  to  religion  than  in  the  earlier 
days  of  that  learning.  The  occurrence  of 


HOPE   OF  RECONCILIATION.         141 

the  exceptional  under  the  control  still  of 
natural  law  is  now  more  clear  to  naturalists 
than  it  was  a  century  ago.  We  have  come 
to  see  something  of  the  latent  in  nature. 
We  have  come,  moreover,  to  perceive  how 
far  the  state  of  mind  of  the  individual  ob- 
server affects  his  perceptions.  In  other 
words,  the  naturalist  of  to-day  more  than 
his  predecessors  feels  how  difficult  it  is  to 
discern  the  exact  truth  by  any  observa- 
tions which  are  not  made  under  the  most 
critical  conditions. 


CHAPTER  IV. 

THE    MARCH    OF   THE    GENERATIONS. 

THE  simpler  realm  of  nature,  that  in 
which  the  organization  of  matter  is  under 
the  control  of  purely  physical  laws  of  ag- 
gregation, so  far  as  our  knowledge  goes, 
gives  us  the  visible  forms  and  shapes  of 
the  celestial  bodies,  the  crystals  and  con- 
cretions and  the  invisible  aggregations  of 
molecules  made  up  of  more  or  less  numer- 
ous atoms  grouped  together  in  definite  on- 
der.  These  shapes  in  the  organic  world,  as 
they  pervade  every  portion  of  its  mass  and 
are  formed  wherever  the  conditions  permit, 
show  u«  that  matter  inevitably  inclines 
towards  a  shapely  order.  All  our  know- 
ledge concerning  the  realm  of  material 
things  leads  us  to  a  belief  in  the  univer- 
sality of  this  impulse  towards  organization. 
The  original  nebulous  or  fragmental  con- 


ORGANIZA  TION.  1 43 

dition  in  which  substances  were  diffused 
through  space  everywhere  tends  to  give 
place  to  the  state  in  which  the  materials 
are  aggregated  into  the  spheres.  When 
this  advance  is  attained,  the  substances 
enter  into  the  more  complex  associations 
which  give  rise  to  chemical  combinations 
or  to  crystalline  bodies.  When  the  adjust- 
ment of  temperature  on  the  surface  of  our 
own  planet  permits,  and  perhaps  also  on 
the  similarly  situated  attendants  of  our 
own  sun  and  of  the  far-away  fixed  stars, 
the  grouping  of  atoms  and  molecules  be- 
comes much  more  complicated.  A  higher 
mode  of  existence  develops,  and  sentient 
life  begins  to  perceive  the  world  about  it. 
As  the  life  of  animals  and  plants  is 
merely  a  higher  stage  in  the  ancient  and 
universal  process  of  development,  such  as 
is  exhibited  in  the  lower  plane  of  physical 
being,  it  should  not  surprise  us  to  find  that 
the  lower  orders  of  creation  in  many  ways 
prefigure  the  higher,  that  the  shapes  of 
crystals  and  concretions  somewhat  resem- 


144     MARCH  OF  THE   GENERATIONS. 

ble  the  organic  forms.  In  the  present  state 
of  our  knowledge  it  is  indeed  not  easy  to 
draw  the  precise  line  between  the  lower 
and  the  higher  orders  of  being.  It  is  only 
in  the  general  results  to  which  they  attain 
that  we  can  secure  the  foundation  on 
which  to  rest  a  philosophical  discrimina- 
tion between  them.  Looking  upon  nature 
in  a  large  way,  we  readily  perceive  that  the 
tendency  of  all  matter  is  towards  more 
complicated  forms  in  the  association  of 
its  ultimate  parts.  Below  the  plane  of 
organic  life  the  successes  in  this  effort  are 
limited  to  a  few  groups  of  forms,  none  of 
which  in  complication  compare  with  that 
feature  as  exhibited  by  truly  living  beings. 
The  limitation  in  the  advance  obtained  by 
the  purely  physical  individualities  of  na- 
ture is  apparently  in  large  part  due  to  the 
fact  that  they  are  but  slightly,  if  at  all,  en- 
dowed with  the  capacity  of  varying  accord- 
ing to  the  circumstances  which  environ 
them.  The  celestial  spheres,  the  various 
substances  arising  from  the  arrangement 


THE   TENDENCY  OF  MATTER.       145 

of  the  molecules,  the  crystals  and  con- 
cretions, which  together  include  all  the 
definite  aggregations  of  matter,  are  sub- 
stantially the  same,  whatsoever  be  the' con- 
ditions in  which  they  come  to  exist.  They 
depend  for  their  organization  altogether 
upon  internal  impulses.  They  are  but 
little  influenced  by  actions  which  come 
from  without.  In  this  feature  the  physi- 
cal units  differ  in  a  most  important  way 
from  associations  of  matter  which  we  rec- 
ognize as  really  endowed  with  life ;  but 
there  is  a  yet  more  important  difference 
correlated  with  that  first  described,  which 
makes  it  possible  for  organic  individuals 
to  store  experience  and  transmit  the  ever- 
accumulated  harvest  of  profit  from  gen- 
eration to  generation. 

All  the  individualities  of  the  physical 
world,  except  the  elementary  atoms,  ex- 
hibit more  or  less  clearly  a  tendency  to 
give  birth  to  forms  like  themselves.  The 
solar  centres  in  their  contraction  throw  off 
planets  and  these  in  turn  develop  satellites. 


146     MARCH  OF  THE   GENERATIONS. 

Molecular  combinations  appear  to  lead  to 
the  grouping  of  other  atoms  into  a  simi- 
lar order.  Crystals  breed  by  some  kind  of 
contagion  other  crystals  like  themselves  ; 
but  all  of  these  foreshadowings  of  the 
generational  process  are  obscure,  and  in 
no  case  does  the  individual  rise  above  the 
level  of  the  forms  whence  it  came.  It  is 
otherwise  in  organic  nature.  There  the 
creatures  are  vastly  more  flexible  than  the 
individuals  of  the  lower  life.  They  adapt 
themselves  in  an  immediate  manner  to  the 
peculiarities  of  their  environment.  Those 
conditions  which  surround  them  make 
an  impression  on  their  bodies  which  is 
transmitted  to  their  progeny,  and  these 
influences,  accumulating  from  age  to  age, 
become  the  precious  store  of  influences 
which  lead  organisms  ever  upward  to 
higher  planes  of  existence. 

It  is  indeed  in  the  ability  of  living 
beings  to  inherit  experience  that  we  find 
the  most  general  and  the  most  impor- 
tant, if  it  be  not  the  sole  characteristic 


INHERITED  EXPERIENCE. 

feature  which  separates  them  from  the 
lower  classes  of  individuals  which  com- 
pose the  universe.  These  grosser  organi- 
zations profit  nothing  from  their  succes- 
sion. The  first  crystals  of  the  primal 
molecules  were  doubtless  in  all  regards 

the   same  as  those  formed  in  the   latest 

/ 

time.  The  organic  form  is  never  exactly 
like  its  ancestors. 

Closely  related  to  this  ability  to  profit  by 
experience  is  another  less  eminent  pecu- 
liarity of  organic  life,  namely,  the  capacity 
of  appropriating  materials  which  it  finds 
stored  in  previously  existing  combinations 
of  matter,  taking  to  itself  such  portion  as 
it  needs  of  their  material  part,  and  con- 
verting the  energy  involved  in  their  chemi- 
cal combinations  to  its  use.  On  these  two 
foundations  rests  the  great  difference  in 
the  nature  of  organic  forms  as  compared 
with  those  not  endowed  with  the  principle 
of  life.  Before  this  organic  grade  of  struc- 
tures was  attained,  all  the  processes  of  na- 
ture led  only  to  an  endless  repetition  of 


148    MARCH  OF  THE   GENERATIONS. 

similar  forms.  We  seem  to  see  in  the  ef- 
forts of  matter  to  rise  above  its  primitive 
simplicity  a  ceaseless,  untiring  striving  to- 
wards the  higher  life,  which,  as  we  have 
seen,  is  attained  only  in  the  strangely  rare 
conditions  which  this  earth  and  possibly 
other  planets  afford,  but  which  cannot 
have  any  place  on  the  stellar  spheres. 

Considered  merely  from  the  point  of 
view  of  their  physical  variety,  the  struc- 
tures of  the  organic  world  vastly  exceed 
those  of  inorganic  nature.  In  that  lower 
realm  we  know  a  few  score  of  elemental 
substances  combined  in  a  few  hundred 
molecular  forms  and  associated  in  perhaps 
a  thousand  distinct  crystalline  shapes.1 

In  the  higher  order  of  life  the  state  of 
matter  permits  the  development  of  an  in- 
conceivably greater  variety  of  individuali- 

1  I  am  fully  aware  of  the  fact  that  in  the  chemist's 
laboratory  an  almost  infinite  range  of  combinations  of 
atoms  and  molecules  can  be  effected.  These,  however, 
appear  to  me  to  be  essentially  unnatural  associations. 
Nothing  like  as  numerous  combinations  exist  in  the 
world  about  us. 


-  DEVELOPMENT  OF  VARIETY.      149 

ties.  There  are  at  present  on  this  sphere 
not  less  than  a  million,  some  estimate  a 
million  and  a  half  species  of  animals  and 
plants,  and  no  one  who  is  familiar  with 
the  geological  record  can  doubt  that  since 
living  things  began  to  exist,  at  least  a  hun- 
dred times  as  many  species  have  dwelt 
upon  the  earth.  But  even  these  vast  and 
inconceivable  numbers  give  us  no  adequate 
impression  as  to  the  variety  of  the  organic 
world,  for  we  must  bear  in  mind  the  fact 
that  each  of  the  countless  individuals  of 
these  numerous  species  exhibits  a  mea- 
sure of  difference  from  its  kindred  much 
greater  than  is  found  in  the  diverse  units 
of  the  mineral  varieties.  The  molecules, 
the  crystals,  or  the  celestial  spheres  are 
substantially  cast  in  the  same  mould  for 
each  kind ;  so  far  as  our  senses  can  discern, 
they  are  as  much  characterized  by  simi- 
larity as  are  the  higher  organisms  by  di- 
versity. It  is  thus  clear  that  the  diver- 
sification of  the  universe  has  been  far 
more  effectively  secured  in  the  relatively 


I5O    MARCH  OF  THE   GENERATIONS. 

trifling  amount  of  matter  which  has  ever 
been  animated  than  in  all  the  enormously 
greater  volume  which  as  yet  has  felt  the 
influence  of  the  physical  powers  alone.  A 
due  consideration  of  these  striking  facts 
will  make  it  clear  to  the  student  that  the 
flower  and  the  fruit  of  the  universal  striv- 
ing after  organization  is  to  be  found,  not 
in  the  vast  aggregations  of  the  solar  sys- 
tems nor  in  the  endless  simple  repetitions 
of  association  in  molecules  and  crystals, 
but  in  the  rare  fields  where  the  conditions 
are  so  balanced  and  related  to  each  other 
as  to  permit  the  materials  to  enter  on  the 
organic  state. 

Although  the  diversification  of  matter, 
the  end  which  seems  to  have  been  every- 
where and  unceasingly  sought,  is  gener- 
ally advanced  by  the  organic  structures, 
the  most  important  novelty  which  life  in- 
troduces into  the  world  consists  in  the 
principle  of  progressive  accumulation  of 
inheritances,  so  that  the  properties  of  the 
structure  are  determined,  not  as  in  the 


PROGRESSIVE  ACCUMULATION.      151 

case  of  the  physical  unit,  by  laws  depen- 
dent upon  the  primal  conditions  of  matter, 
but  by  experiences  won  in  the  earlier  life, 
either  in  that  of  the  individual  or  in  that 
of  its  ancestors  since  the  beginning  of  the 
series  to  which  it  belongs.  Material  forms 
remain  unchanged,  or  if  destroyed  fall  back 
to  more  simple  states  of  being,  leaving 
no  trace  of  their  previous  existence.  Or- 
ganic structures  are  ceaselessly  changing 
the  store  of  experience,  and  this  store  is 
transmitted  by  each  generation  to  its  suc- 
cessor, and  so  age  by  age  they  vary  in 
their  attitude  towards  the  world.  They 
alone  can  harvest  the  light  and  transmit  it 
in  ever-increasing  store. 

It  is  impossible  to  observe  the  contrast 
between  animate  and  inanimate  creatures 
without  coming  to  the  conclusion  that  the 
capacity  to  acquire  and  transmit  is  the  in- 
finitely peculiar  and  important  gain  which 
living  creatures  have  won.  All  their  other 
characteristics  are  of  relatively  slight  value 
when  compared  with  this  feature.  Mea- 


152    MARCH  OF  THE   GENERATIONS. 

sured  in  the  terms  of  our  own  understand- 
ing, this  introduction  of  truly  historic  be- 
ings into  the  universe  is  the  greatest 
revolution  which  we  can  conceive  to  have 
occurred  in  all  the  processes  of  nature 
since  that  atom  of  the  all  which  we  term 
the  visible  universe  came  forth  from  that 
which  was  before.  By  the  slight  but  stead- 
fast increment  of  profit  which  contact  with 
the  neighboring  world  affords  living  be- 
ings, they  rise  farther  above  the  plain  of 
material  existence,  generation  by  genera- 
tion. The  simpler  ways  of  appreciating 
the  surrounding  nature  are  gradually  de- 
veloped until  the  higher  or  intellectual 
state  of  sentiency  is  attained.  Finally  in 
ourselves  the  age's  product  of  understand- 
ing looks  off  upon  the  universe  with  com- 
prehending mind. 

Assuming,  as  we  are  entitled  to  do,  that 
the  progressive  development  of  life  in 
structure  and  intellectual  power  is  the 
crowning  achievement  of  the  organizing 
motives  in  the  universe,  let  us  now  con- 


LIMITS  OF  ADVANCEMENT.  153 

sider  the  limits  which  the  physical  condi- 
tions set  upon  this  process  of  advance- 
ment. As  we  shall  at  once  see,  this  is  a 
question  of  transcendent  importance,  for 
it  affects  the  whole  aspect  of  the  animate 
world  in  the  profoundest  manner.  On  it 
depend  the  processes  of  birth,  life,  and 
death,  and  all  the  other  features  connected 
with  the  march  of  the  generations.  There 
is  indeed  no  other  problem  which  the  nat- 
uralist has  to  consider  which  is  so  full  of 
importance  to  the  student  of  life.  Whether 
he  approaches  the  question  from  a  purely 
historic  or  from  a  moral  point  of  view,  he 
will  find  that  he  is  almost  appalled  by  the 
momentous  nature  of  the  considerations 
which  are  presented  to  him. 

The  most  important  result  attained  by 
the  organic  system  of  this  planet  mani- 
festly consists  in  the  invention  of  individ- 
ual organic  beings,  each  of  which  endures 
but  for  a  moment  of  time  and  then  gives 
place  to  its  successors.  If  we  could  but 
divest  ourselves  of  that  commonplace  view 


154    MARCH  OF  THE   GENERATIONS. 

of  nature  which  dims  the  vision  of  the 
keenest-eyed  and  limits  the  sight  of  less 
cultivated  men,  we  should  perceive  the 
singular  momentariness  of  the  individual 
in  the  organic  series  to  which  it  belongs. 
If  we  look  upon  the  creatures  of  any  field 
or  forest,  we  observe  that  the  greater  part 
of  them  endure  but  for  a  summer.  Within 
the  limits  of  a  single  square  mile  of  fertile 
ground  there  may  in  the  summer  time  be 
three  or  four  thousand  species,  counting 
only  plants,  insects,  and  the  higher  forms 
of  animals.  Nearly  all  of  these  perish 
after  a  brief  term  of  individual  life,  first 
bringing  forth  their  eggs  or  seed,  which 
they  place  where  the  next  season's  sun 
may  quicken  them  ;  then  they  return  to 
that  great  store  of  the  soil  whence  all  life 
springs.  Nothing  else  in  nature,  save  the 
waves  of  light  and  heat,  which  by  their 
pulsations  bear  forth  the  blessed  power  of 
the  sun,  or  the  swift  successive  whirlings 
of  the  celestial  spheres  on  their  axes  of 
rotation,  bringing  the  recurrence  of  day 


SHORTNESS  OF  LIFE.  155 

and  night,  is  parallel  to  this  endless  com- 
ing and  going  of  the  generations.  Nor 
can  these  waves  of  ether  or  planetary  spin- 
nings be  compared  with  the  succession  of 
living  things ;  for  they  are  but  motions, 
while  in  the  organic  forms  the  process  of 
change  involves  the  rapid  concurrence  of 
a  host  of  molecules  of  matter  into  definite 
order,  and  their  equally  rapid  return  to 
a  lower  state  of  relative  disorganization. 
With  each  of  these  surges  of  life  which 
the  generational  impulse  sends  on,  millions 
and  millions  of  atoms  and  molecules  spring 
into  order,  and  by  their  complicated  accord 
lift  the  association  into  the  organic  state ; 
then  in  a  moment  the  mastering  impulse 
goes  from  them  and  they  fall  back  into  the 
inanimate  realm.  To  an  intellectual  being, 
whose  lifetime  was  framed  in  terms  of  the 
geologic  ages,  this  generational  movement 
of  the  organic  forms  of  the  earth  would 
probably  appear  as  do  the  waves  of  sound 
or  of  light  to  ourselves.  To  such  a  crea- 
ture the  successive  oscillations  would  prob- 


156    MARCH  OF  THE    GENERATIONS. 

ably  be  hidden  from  the  senses,  and  only 
a  continuous  impression  of  advancement 
in  the  really  unbroken  series  of  existence 
would  be  presented  to  his  attention.  If 
such  a  supposed  being  were  endowed  with 
continuous  life,  and  should  proceed  to  an- 
alyze the  phenomena  of  animate  nature, 
he  would  gain  certain  impressions  denied 
to  us  by  the  exceeding  brevity  of  our  lives. 
He  would  quickly  and  clearly  see  what  we 
but  half  perceive,  —  that  in  a  physical 
sense  and  in  the  large  reckoning  the  in- 
dividual is  of  but  little  account,  is  in  fact 
but  a  stepping-stone  over  which  the  great 
processes  of  being  pass  in  their  upward 
and  onward  going.  So  trifling  an  ele- 
ment would  the  separate  life  seem  that 
this  inquirer  might  well  ask  the  question 
why  the  individual  is  subjected  to  this 
endless  separation  from  and  return  to 
the  animate  world ;  why  the  primal  form 
should  not  go  on  unfolding  its  possibilities 
of  development  without  the  use  of  this 
costly  machinery  of  the  generations.  It 


ADVANCE  IN  ORGANIZATION.       157 

is  not  worth  while  for  us  to  essay  the 
explanation  which  that  age-enduring  spirit 
would  have  to  give.  We  must  be  content 
with  the  finite  answer  we  derive  from 
our  scanty  opportunities  for  studying  the 
phenomena.  This  is  in  effect  as  follows : 
All  advance  in  organization  depends 
upon  processes  of  reconstruction,  on  the 
rearrangement  of  molecules  in  definite  and 
somewhat  stable  order,  and  the  creation 
of  new  parts  by  their  combinations.  At 
the  same  time  all  life  depends  as  well  on 
the  simultaneous  orderly  correlation  of  the 
material  parts  of  which  the  being  is  com- 
posed ;  on  the  continuous  activity  of  the 
organs  and  their  material  accord.  Thus 
the  execution  of  the  work  on  which  the  ex- 
istence of  the  body  depends  makes  it  im- 
possible for  the  frame  to  be  in  a  state  of 
flux,  which  advancement  demands.  Like 
other  structures,  it  must  cease  to  function 
if  important  improvements  in  the  design 
are  to  be  effected.  It  would  have  been 
possible,  we  may  assume,  for  an  infinite 


158     MARCH  OF  THE   GENERATIONS. 

power  to  have  so  arranged  the  vital  en- 
gines that  there  need  have  been  only  a 
certain  limited  number  of  them  in  the 
world,  each  enduring  for  all  the  geologic 
ages.  This  is  not  the  plan  which  nature 
presents  to  us.  •  All  the  manifold  series  of 
organic  beings  exhibit  the  scheme  in  which 
each  individual  is  brought  under  the  best 
attainable  conditions,  which  guide  it  to 
maturity.  When  its  structure  is  complete, 
it  profits  by  the  inheritances  transmitted 
to  it  by  its  ancestors,  and  hands  on  that 
body  of  profit  along  with  the  accretions 
won  during  the  individual  life,  and  then 
passes  away. 

In  observing  the  march  of  the  genera- 
tions the  student  cannot  afford  to  limit 
his  inquiry  to  the  general  aspects  of  the 
phenomena ;  he  needs  to  trace  in  much 
detail  the  process  by  which  the  unend- 
ing advance  in  the  grade  of  organization 
has  been  secured.  As  yet  the  researches 
of  naturalists  have  mainly  been  directed  to 
the  simpler  facts  connected  with  the  his- 


PROCESS  OF  DEVELOPMENT.        159 

tory  of  life  upon  this  earth.  Geologists 
have  used  those  "medals  of  creation" 
which  the  fossils  afford  in  the  same  way 
as  the  historian  uses  the  coins  which  he 
finds  in  ancient  cities.  In  both  cases,  the 
remains  serve  to  identify  periods  and  to 
trace  the  succession  in  the  peopling  of 
a  district.  Paleontologists,  who  consider 
fossils  from  the  point  of  view  of  the  rela- 
tions of  species,  have,  it  is  true,  to  a  certain 
extent  essayed  to  determine  the  genealogi- 
cal trees  of  the  organic  series  ;  but  on  the 
whole  their  labors,  until  the  reign  of  Dar- 
win, were  confined  to  very  limited  fields. 
Thus,  although  we  have  a  vast  body  of  in- 
formation concerning  the  development  of 
animals  and  plants  in  geologic  time,  there 
is  little  of  it  which  is  suited  to  afford  the 
unprofessional  reader  a  clear  idea  as  to 
the  steps  by  which  the  organic  series  ad- 
vance. Although  the  time  is  not  yet  ripe 
for  the  presentation  of  this  great  prob- 
lem in  a  clear  manner,  we  have  secured 
enough  information  to  enable  us  to  pre- 


160     MARCH  OF  THE   GENERATIONS. 

sent,  at  least  in  a  general  way,  a  statement 
as  to  the  process  by  which  development  is 
attained. 

In  considering  the  advance  of  the  or- 
ganic series  it  is  by  no  means  necessary 
to  approach  the  matter  with  any  prepos- 
sessions concerning  the  nature  of  the  laws 
which  determine  the  ongoing.  For  our 
purpose,  indeed,  it  is  better  to  put  aside  the 
question  as  to  the  measure  of  the  truth 
which  the  Darwinian  and  other  views  af- 
ford, and  to  consider  animals  and  plants 
in  their  purely  phenomenal  aspect.  Impor- 
tant as  are  the  several  doctrines  which 
have  been  adduced  in  explanation  of  the 
facts  presented  by  these  creatures,  the 
visible  truth  demands  the  first  attention 
of  all  students.  Limiting  ourselves,  there- 
fore, to  the  phenomenal  aspects  exhibited 
in  the  successions  of  life,  we  shall  briefly 
set  forth,  somewhat  in  the  manner  of  a 
catalogue,  the  general  truths  which  have 
been  secured  by  the  study  of  the  earth's 
organic  history. 


IMPORTANT  ERRORS.  l6l 

Organic  life  began  with  exceedingly 
simple  combinations  of  a  structural  sort, 
which  were  formed  in  the  earlier  geo- 
logic ages,  and  has  advanced  by  succes- 
sive stages  of  evolution  from  its  primitive 
simplicity  to  its  present  exceeding  com- 
plication. This  advance  is  exhibited  not 
only  in  the  material  body  but  in  the  intel- 
ligence as  well.  The  foregoing  proposi- 
tions contain  the  most  important  and  gen- 
erally well-founded  truths  which  natural 
science  has  contributed  to  human  know- 
ledge. Although  they  were  affirmed  of 
old,  for  the  Greeks  had  some  vague  per- 
ception of  them,  their  demonstration  has 
been  the  triumph  of  this  century.  As  is 
the  case  with  many  other  scientific  truths, 
the  general  understanding  of  these  max- 
ims is  somewhat  in  error,  and  these  errors 
are  too  important  to  be  passed  without 
correction.  It  is  in  all  cases  difficult  to 
keep  the  popular  understanding  in  such 
matters  in  the  qualified  shape  in  which 
framed  by  men  of  science  ;  thus  the  gen- 


1 62    MARCH  OF  THE   GENERATIONS. 

eral  conception  as  to  the  nature  of  the 
earth's  path  around  the  sun  is  exceedingly 
erroneous.  Most  people  imagine  that  our 
sphere  has  a  circular  orbit  ;  those  who  are 
better  informed  are  aware  that  its  way  is 
elliptical;  but  few  save  astronomers  con- 
ceive the  almost  indescribable  irregulari- 
ties in  its  course.  In  fact,  it  would  be  safer 
to  say  that  all  the  complications  of  move- 
ment have  never  been  at  one  time  com- 
passed by  any  human  intelligence.  When, 
by  means  of  diagrams  and  explanations, 
which  take  account  only  of  the  larger 
truths,  we  bring  this  apparently  simple 
matter  of  the  earth's  movement  aroun-d 
the  sun  into  a  condition  to  be  understood, 
we  at  the  same  time  neglect  a  great  body 
of  facts  concerning  the  motions  some  of 
which  have  great  influence  on  the  or- 
ganic history  of  this  planet. 

Seeing  how  much  is  necessarily  neg- 
lected in  our  account  of  the  earth's  orbit, 
it  is  not  difficult  to  imagine  how  much 
greater  is  the  amount  of  the  omission 


INCOMPLETE  RECORDS.  163 

which  we  make  in  our  general  proposi- 
tions concerning  the  path  of  organic  life. 
In  fact,  the  qualifications  which  we  have 
to  apply  to  the  statements  are  much  more 
extensive  and  vastly  more  important  than 
are  those  which  have  to  be  introduced 
if  we  would  express  the  truth  with  refer- 
ence to  the  planetary  motions.  The  first 
of  these  corrections  to  which  the  student 
should  attend  relates  to  the  extent  of  our 
information  concerning  the  earlier  stages 
of  the  organic  series.  It  is  not  true  that 
we  have  found,  even  in  the  most  ancient 
rocks,  the  first  steps  of  any  organic  series. 
The  fact  is  that  we  trace  living  forms  from 
the  present  day  downward  through  the 
rocks  and  backward  through  the  geologic 
ages  to  the  plane  of  the  Lower  Cambrian, 
in  which  horizon  life  is  abundant ;  and 
though  of  a  lower  grade  than  that  of  to- 
day, still  vastly  removed  from  what  we 
may  term  conditions  of  primitive  simpli- 
city. In  general  it  may  be  said  that  we 
have  followed  in  outline  the  steps  which 


1 64    MARCH  OF  THE   GENERATIONS. 

form  the  upper  half  of  the  long  ladder 
which  has  led  to  the  higher  forms  of 
plants  and  animals  such  as  now  exist  on 
the  earth.  In  the  earliest  legible  chapter 
of  the  great  stone  book  we  readily  per- 
ceive that  the  record  begins  somewhere 
near  half-way  down  in  the  history  of  or- 
ganic events.  There  is  not  much  reason 
to  hope  that  we  shall  ever  recover  the 
missing  volumes  of  the  great  chronicle. 
The  dead  past  has  not  only  buried  its  dead, 
but  has  quite  effaced  the  burial-places. 

It  must  not  be  supposed  that  the  great 
blank  in  the  geologic  records  which  con- 
cerns the  history  of  life  before  the  Cam- 
brian time  is  the  only  destroyed  portion 
of  the  period.  It  is  indeed  only  the  first 
and  greatest  of  the  many  missing  parts 
of  the  history.  Beginning  with  the  pres- 
ent day  and  going  backward  step  by  step 
through  the  records,  we  find  a  great  num- 
ber of  these  lapses,  each  of  which  has  to 
be  bridged  with  conjecture  until  the  stu- 
dents of  the  earth  are  able,  through  the 


INSTITUTION  OF  SPECIES.          165 

discovery  of  other  strata,  to  fill  the  gaps. 
A  large  part  of  the  vast  labor  which  is 
devoted  to  the  interpretation  of  rocks  is 
directed  to  this  end  of  supplying  the  miss- 
ing links.  It  is  readily  to  be  conceived 
that  all  these  breaks  in  the  record  make 
it  difficult  for  those  who  seek  to  interpret 
the  history  of  life  to  trace  the  march 
of  the  generations  from  the  earlier  ages 
to  the  present  day.  Fragmentary  as  the 
work  as  yet  is,  it  may  fairly  be  said  that 
even  to  the  most  critical  the  evidence  is 
sufficient  to  warrant  the  statements  which 
we  shall  now  present. 

It  is  a  very  evident  fact  that  in  the  pro- 
cess of  organic  advance  the  steps  of  the 
ongoing  are  attained  through  the  institu- 
tion of  distinct  species,  each  composed  of 
innumerable  individuals  which  for  a  time 
preserve  something  like  similar  forms,  and 
then  with  more  or  less  suddenness  change 
their  aspect  so  that  they  must  be  regarded 
as  specifically  distinct  from  the  creatures 
which  gave  them  birth.  Without  under- 


1 66    MARCH  OF  THE   GENERATIONS. 

taking  the  almost  impossible  task  of  defin- 
ing what  we  mean  or  should  mean  by  the 
term  species,  we  may  for  our  present  pur- 
pose say  that  the  word  is  to  be  applied 
to  an  assemblage  of  living  beings  which 
freely  interbreed,  and  which  have  for  the 
time  effected  a  certain  measure  of  adjust- 
ment of  their  conditions  and  relations 
with  the  organic  and  inorganic  world  with 
which  they  come  in  contact.  So  long  as 
this  adjustment  does  not  vary  through 
the  action  of  the  many  perturbing  causes, 
the  like  reproduces  like,  and  the  species 
remains  in  what  we  may  term  a  static  con- 
dition. When  the  change  occurs,  a  por- 
tion or  the  whole  of  the  individuals  con- 
tained in  the  group  undergo  variations 
which  —  sometimes  speedily,  sometimes 
slowly  —  lead  to  departures  from  the  an- 
cestral state.  The  range  in  the  pliability 
of  these  cohorts  of  organisms  which  we 
term  species  is  exceedingly  great.  In 
some  groups,  as  for  instance  in  the  bra- 
chiopoda,  a  species  may  remain  almost 


THE  RATE  OF  VARIATION.          167 

constant  through  all  the  geologic  ages 
from  the  Lower  Cambrian  to  the  present 
day.  Thus  in  the  genus  lingula,  the 
best-known  member  of  this  group,  there 
are  existing  forms  which,  so  far  as  we  can 
judge  from  their  well-preserved  shells,  de- 
part less  from  their  ancestors  which  lived 
in  the  earliest  geologic  periods  where  dis- 
tinct fossils  have  been  found,  than  do  the 
individuals  in  ordinarily  variable  species. 
If  we  rested  our  opinion  on  the  facts  pre- 
sented by  the  remains  of  these  creatures, 
we  might  fairly  conclude  that  the  earliest 
varieties  and  those  now  living  might  have 
bred  together. 

In  the  same  group  which  contains  the 
lingula  we  find  other  genera,  in  which  the 
species  are  in  such  a  state  of  flux,  as 
regards  all  the  important  features  of  the 
organism,  that  within  the  limits  of  a  few 
feet  of  strata  the  shapes  undergo  a  greater 
change  than  has  come  about  in  the  lingu- 
las  in  all  the  period  of  their  history  which 
we  can  trace.  We  may  indeed  say  that 


1 68      MARCH  OF  THE   GENERATIONS. 

the  rate  of  alteration  among  animals  and 
plants,  even  in  species  which  are  some- 
what nearly  akin,  varies  in  the  ratio  of  at 
least  one  to  a  thousand.  If  we  could  mea- 
sure the  range  accurately,  it  might  well 
prove  to  be  ten  times  as  great  as  the  pro- 
portion which  we  have  just  indicated.  In 
general  the  swiftness  with  which  organic 
species  are  modified  is  greater  in  the 
higher  than  in  the  lower  forms.  The  nu- 
merous instances  of  permanence  allied  to 
that  just  above  noted  are  almost  all  found 
in  the  groups  which  may  fairly  be  ranked 
as  low  in  the  scale  of  being.  They  all 
fall  into  the  classes  of  animals  commonly 
known  as  invertebrates;  that  is,  below  the 
series  of  backboned  creatures  to  which 
man  belongs.  In  most  cases  the  change- 
lessness  is  associated  with  unvarying  hab- 
its of  life,  yet  there  are  not  wanting  in- 
stances in  which  along  with  a  total  change 
in  the  mode  of  living  the  form  remains 
unaltered.  The  most  notable  example  of 
this  nature  is  found  in  the  species  of  cray- 


CRAYFISHES.  169 

fishes,  which  have  the  habit  of  excavat- 
ing complicated  subterranean  chambers, 
in  which  they  dwell  for  the  greater  part 
of  their  lives.  Although  the  crayfishes 
belong  to  a  group  of  animals  which  in 
general  possess  a  very  elastic  body,  forms 
which  vary  readily  with  the  alteration  of 
habit,  they  have  undergone  no  change 
in  shape  to  fit  them  for  this  peculiar 
method  of  life.  All  their  parts  are  very 
similar  to  those  of  the  kindred  lobsters, 
a  group  from  which  they  appear  to  have 
sprung  at  some  time  during  the  paleozoic 
era.  Our  wonder  at  the  rigid  form  of  the 
crayfish  is  the  greater  when  we  consider 
that  the  group  has  revolutionized  the 
stages  by  which  it  passes  from  the  egg 
to  the  adult.  While  the  lobsters,  which 
it  so  closely  resembles,  exhibit  in  com- 
mon with  the  other  crustaceans  a  series 
of  metamorphoses  occurring  after  extru- 
sion from  the  egg,  the  crayfishes  have 
abandoned  these  stages,  which  would  be 
inconvenient  in  their  habit  of  life,  and 


MARCH  OF  THE   GENERATIONS. 

proceed,  even  in  the  first  epochs  of  their 
independent  life,  directly  to  the  adult 
form. 

Such  instances  as  those  afforded  by  the 
crayfish  are  rare,  but  the  naturalist  knows 
hundreds  of  cases  which  serve,  though  in 
a  less  effective  way,  to  indicate  that  the 
measure  of  change  which  alterations  of  en- 
vironment can  produce  in  a  species  varies 
in  a  great  and  remarkable  manner.  It  is 
therefore  evident  that  the  rate  at  which 
organic  forms  may  alter  is  dependent  on 
other  influences  besides  those  which  arise 
from  the  immediate  instance  of  environ- 
ment. I  have  elsewhere  (see  page  90) 
undertaken  to  show  that  the  variability  of 
animals  and  plants  may  depend  in  large 
measure  upon  an  internal  and  invisible 
contest  among  and  between  the  host  of 
their  inheritances.  For  our  present  pur- 
pose, it  is  sufficient  to  note  that  something 
else  besides  the  surrounding  nature  and 
the  expressed  motives  which  serve  to  de- 
termine the  habits  of  life  enters  into  the 


RE  TROGRESSION.  1 7 1 

equation  which  controls  the  shape  of  the 
creature.  In  the  present  state  of  our 
science  the  conditions  which  bring  about 
organic  variation  are  rarely  discernible. 
We  only  perceive  the  endless  flow  of 
change.  All  our  theories  as  to  the  cause 
thereof  are  still  in  the  field  of  working 
hypotheses,  or,  in  simpler  phrase,  they  are 
conjectures ;  though,  be  it  said,  of  a  scien- 
tific sort. 

The  next  point  which  the  student  will 
do  well  to  note  concerns  the  end  to  which 
the  variation  of  species  naturally  leads. 
It  is  a  common  supposition  that  the  direc- 
tion of  the  movement  is  ever  upward.  The 
fact  is  that  in  a  large  number  of  cases, 
perhaps  in  the  aggregate  in  more  than 
half,  the  change  gives  rise  to  a  form 
which,  by  all  the  canons  by  which  we  de- 
termine relative  rank,  is  to  be  regarded 
as  regressive  or  degradational.  In  many 
cases  the  advancement  or  retrogression % 
appears  to  be  determined  by  the  condi- 
tions of  the  environment.  Thus  the  kin- 


MARCH  OF  THE  GENERATIONS. 

dred  of  the  shrimps  may,  by  the  better 
adjustment  of  their  bodily  parts  to  the 
needs  of  an  active  life,  go  onward  to  the 
higher  structure  of  the  lobsters  and  crabs  ; 
or,  on  the  other  hand,  certain  varieties,  tak- 
ing up  the  habit  of  dwelling  in  the  gills 
of  the  fishes,  where  their  life  is  of  the  sim- 
plest sort,  may  sink  downward  through 
many  gradations  of  decline  to  a  state  in 
which  they  closely  resemble  the  worms. 
A  yet  more  common  cause  of  degradation 
is  found  in  those  cases  in  which  a  group, 
such  as  the  ammonites,  after  flourishing 
for  geologic  ages,  and  developing  a  great 
variety  of  species,  appears  gradually  to 
enter  on  a  state  of  decrepitude,  in  which 
the  variations  which  before  led  upward 
afterwards  bring  about  a  steadfast  decline. 
Although  this  last-described  class  of  deg- 
radation has  only  been  traced  in  a  clear 
manner  in  a  few  organic  series,  it  probably 
occurs  throughout  the  animal  and  vege- 
table kingdoms.  Species,  genera,  fami- 
lies, and  orders  have  all,  like  the  individ- 


DANGER  IN  VARIATION.  173 

uals  of  which  they  are  composed,  a  period 
of  decay  in  which  the  organic  gain  won 
with  infinite  toil  and  pains  is  altogether 
lost  in  the  old  age  of  the  group. 

When  any  organic  species  rapidly  va- 
ries in  shape  or  habits,  it  seems  to  be 
in  danger  of  extermination.  The  danger 
probably  arises  from  the  change  in  the 
relation  of  the  body  to  its  environment, 
which  the  alterations  bring  about.  It  is 
easy  to  see  that  these  innovations  have  an 
experimental  quality,  and  the  result  of  the 
essay  is  to  bring  the  individuals  who  make 
it  more  or  less  in  peril.  So  long  as  a 
form  remains  quietly  within  the  adjust- 
ment which  may  have  preserved  it  un- 
harmed for  ages,  its  estate  is  secure  ;  when 
it  seeks  new  methods  of  life,  it  encounters 
unwonted  risks.  If  by  the  variation  it  is 
led  into  a  field  of  being  where  the  equa- 
tions which  affect  it  are  distinctly  and  per- 
manently profitable,  a  new  specific  form 
may  be  established  and  maintained.  It  is 
clear,  however,  that  a  large  part  of  the 


174    MARCH  OF  THE   GENERATIONS, 

new  forms  which  arise  in  any  organic  se- 
ries are  necessarily  unsuited  to  endure. 
Where  the  variations  occur  with  reference 
to  the  habits  of  some  other  animal  or 
plant,  where  they  are  so  arranged  as  to 
give  the  creature  immunity  from  a  particu- 
lar enemy,  or  to  secure  it  food  from  some 
peculiar  source,  a  modification  in  a  single 
feature  of  the  environment  may  lead  to  its 
death.  Thus  it  comes  about  that  the  gen- 
eral feeders,  those  forms  like  the  lingulae 
which  take  their  sustenance  from  a  great 
variety  of  organic  materials  such  as  float 
in  sea  water,  appear  to  be  very  persisting 
forms  ;  so,  too,  the  species  which  have  de- 
vised peculiar  and  effective  methods  of  pro- 
tection which  secure  them  immunity  from 
enemies  are  apt  to  maintain  their  shapes 
unchanged  for  ages.  A  familiar  instance 
of  this  is  found  in  certain  mollusks,  such 
as  our  common  clam,  where  the  individuals 
excavate  chambers  in  the  mud  of  the  sea 
bottom  which  are  admirably  devised  to 
secure  them  against  assault.  These  well- 


DIFFICULTY  OF  ADVANCE.          175 

sheltered  forms  retain  their  characteristics 
for  geologic  periods,  while  the  more  super- 
ficial inhabitants  of  the  sea-floor  are  sub- 
ject to  relatively  great  alteration.  A  con- 
trasted instance  may  be  found  in  the  case 
of  such  insects  as  depend  for  their  sub- 
sistence on  particular  species  of  plants. 
The  definiteness  of  their  conditions  ren- 
ders them  liable  to  speedy  destruction. 

The  foregoing  considerations,  which 
could  be  indefinitely  extended  and  still 
leave  us  without  an  adequate  conception 
as  to  the  accidents  which  may  befall  spe- 
cies, may  serve  as  a  foundation  on  which 
to  build  a  better  understanding  concern- 
ing the  difficulties  which  beset  the  contin- 
uous advance  of  animal  and  vegetable  life. 
To  insure  the  passage  from  a  lower  to  a 
higher  grade  of  organization,  it  is  neces- 
sary that  the  variation  in  form  should  be 
such  as  will  lead  it  to  break  through  the 
wall  of  environment  in  that  part  of  its 
periphery  which  leads  towards  a  higher 
plane  of  being.  Attaining  a  new  plane, 


MARCH  OF  THE   GENERATIONS. 

the  ongoing  host  appears  in  most  cases  to 
regain  a  temporary  permanence  of  shape, 
and  by  thus  becoming  more  or  less  fixed 
in  its  characteristics  is  enabled  to  balance 
itself  with  its  environment.  Then  again 
variations  occur  which  may  lead  another 
step  upward,  but  which  are  far  more  likely 
to  bring  the  procession  of  life  into  some 
unprofitable  field,  in  which  degradation  or 
death  ensues.  In  order  to  conceive  the 
relative  infrequency  with  which  the  varia- 
tions occur  in  such  a  way  as  to  insure  or- 
ganic advance,  we  must  now  turn  our  atten- 
tion to  the  number  of  specific  forms  which 
have  been  developed  during  the  march  of 
the  generations,  and  compare  the  total 
with  the  sum  of  successes  in  the  way  of 
advancement  which  has  been  attained. 

Although  the  census  of  organic  beings 
now  in  existence  on  the  earth's  surface  is 
as  yet  incomplete,  enough  is  known  to 
make  it  clear  that  the  total  number  of 
these  discriminated  forms  is  much  more 
than  a  million.  If  we  could  go  back  to 


NUMBER   OF  SPECIES. 

the  time  of  the  middle  tertiary  and  com- 
pare the  forms  then  existing  with  those 
now  alive,  we  should  find  that  the  number 
of  species  in  the  earlier  time  was  nearly 
as  great  as  at  present,  but  that  by  far  the 
larger  portion  of  these  forms  were  evi- 
dently distinct  from  those  now  living  on 
the  earth.  If  we  could  in  a  similar  man- 
ner proceed  backward  through  the  geo- 
logic ages  to  the  dawn  of  life,  it  seems 
quite  certain  that  the  total  number  of  spe- 
cies which  could  be  observed  would  ex- 
ceed one  hundred  million.  Although  this 
estimate  may  seem  to  some  naturalists  un- 
reasonably high,  few  if  any  of  those  who 
have  endeavored  to  ascertain  the  specific 
variety  exhibited  by  the  animals  in  the 
paleozoic  seas,  and  who  at  the  same  time 
have  taken  account  of  the  vast  unrecorded 
time  before  the  deposition  of  the  Cam- 
brian beds,  will  esteem  the  reckoning  ex- 
cessive. 

Turning  now  to  the  consideration  of  the 
numbers  of  the  highly  successful  organic 


MARCH  OF  THE  GENERATIONS. 

forms  which  have  come  into  existence 
through  the  vast  experiments  of  the  past, 
we  see  at  once  how  infrequent  are  the 
ways  which  lead  through  the  ages  stead- 
fastly and  unbrokenly  towards  eminent 
success.  Considered  merely  from  the 
point  of  view  of  organic  perfection,  the 
greater  part  of  the  living  forms,  whether 
of  animals  or  of  plants,  may  fairly  be  re- 
garded as  successful.  If,  however,  we 
take  account  of  intellectual  advancement 
as  well  as  of  physical  construction,  we  may 
well  be  surprised  at  the  few  instances  in 
which  a  high  grade  of  development  has 
been  attained.  It  requires  no  argument 
to  show  the  student  that  the  transcend- 
ent successes  of  life  are  to  be  found 
among  those  forms  where  something  like 
a  social  system  has  been  instituted,  — 
where  the  individuals  of  a  species  ex- 
change their  services  in  mutually  helpful 
cooperation,  which  results  in  the  creation 
of  a  commonwealth.  This,  the  highest 
grade  of  organization,  has  been  in  a  mea- 


THE  RATIO  OF  SUCCESSES.  179 

sure  attained  in  but  a  few  hundred  spe- 
cies. The  bees,  the  ants,  and  the  ter- 
mites among  the  insects,  a  number  of  spe- 
cies among  the  birds,  a  few  scor^  forms 
of  mammals^  make  up  the  total  of  these 
accomplishments.  In  only  one  genus, 
that  in  which  we  ourselves  belong,  has 
the  success  been  preeminent.  It  indeed 
so  far  transcends  all  the  other  accomplish- 
ments as  to  lie  in  a  realm  apart  from  the 
"rest  of  organic  life.  We  thus  see  that 
even  if  we  take  into  account  all  the  ani- 
mals which  have  invented  a  society,  call- 
ing the  number  of  these  species  one  thou- 
sand, the  ratio  of  the  eventual  triumphs 
to  the  relative  failures  is  about  one  to  one 
hundred  thousand.  If  we  count  man,  as 
we  well  may,  as  the  solitary  distinguished 
success,  then  the  proportion  is  something 
like  one  to  a  hundred  million. 

With  the  above  described  conception 
as  to  the  position  of  man,  let  us  proceed 
with  our  task  of  framing  a  picture  of  the 
stages  of  advance  upon  which  his  develop- 


ISO    MARCH  OF  THE   GENERATIONS. 

ment  has  absolutely  depended.  Taking 
no  account  of  the  collateral  kindred,  and 
reckoning  only  the  species  which  have 
afforded  the  steps  on  the  long  way  from 
the  dawn  of  life  to  the  estate  of  man,  we 
find  the  number  of  these  specific  steps 
in  the  organic  genealogy  of  mankind  to 
be  inconceivably  numerous.  It  is  certain 
that  they  must  have  been  counted  by  the 
thousand.  It  is  difficult  indeed  to  conceive 
an  upward  gradation  from  the  inorganic 
basis  of  life  to  the  station  of  man  with- 
out a  succession  of  specifically  different 
forms  which  would  vastly  transcend  the 
last-named  number.  It  is  my  individual 
opinion  that  the  specific  variations  which 
have  led  to  the  human  form  may  well 
have  amounted  to  near  a  hundred  thou- 
sand. Even  if  we  limit  the  species  in 
our  ancestry  to  as  small  a  total  as  ten 
thousand,  we  have  to  assume  an  almost 
impossible  rate  of  change  to  bring  the 
development  within  the  limits  which  are 
commonly  set  for  the  duration  of  recorded 


THE  NUMBER  OF  STEPS.  l8l 

• 

geologic  time.  Most  observers  are  dis- 
posed to  assume  that  organic  life  began 
at  something  like  a  hundred  million  years 
ago.  Dividing  this  period  into  ten  thou- 
sand intervals,  we  should  have  to  come 
to  the  conclusion  that  the  average  time 
required  to  effect  the  transition  from  one 
species  to  another  did  not  exceed  ten 
thousand  years.  If  the  number  of  spe- 
cific forms  in  the  series  which  leads  to 
man  was  a  hundred  thousand,  then  the 
time  required  for  each  of  the  transitions 
was  not  more  than  a  millennium.  All 
the  evidence  goes  to  show  that  even  the 
greater  of  these  durations  would  have 
been  insufficient  in  length. 

We  next  come  to  a  point  of  great  impor- 
tance, one  which  is  generally  neglected 
in  the  considerations  which  are  now  oc- 
cupying our  attention,  and  which  may  be 
briefly  stated  as  follows  :  The  develop- 
ment of  a  continuous  organic  series,  such 
as  that  which  has  led  to  man,  or  any  other 
of  the  higher  organisms  existing  at  the 


1 82      MARCH  OF  THE   GENERATIONS. 

present  day,  depends  upon  the  institution 
of  each  new  species  in  the  chain  of  being 
at  a  certain  time  and  place  in  the  life 
of  the  antecedent  form.  The  ascending 
branch  must  go  forth  and  establish  itself 
in  relation  to  its  environment  before  the 
immediate  progenitors  have  become  seri- 
ously enfeebled.  The  advance  must  be 
made  from  somewhere  near  the  highest 
plane  of  the  antecedent  life.  Thus  in  our 
degradational  series,  we  do  not  find  new 
ascending  stems  which  attain  the  develop- 
ment which  has  been  lost  in  the  descent. 
Moreover,  if  any  species  in  the  direct 
line  of  advancement  fails  to  give  off  the 
ascending  shoot,  but  passes  away  with- 
out leaving  the  improved  generation,  all 
chance  of  further  advance  on  that  particu- 
lar line  is  lost.  To  perceive  the  momen- 
tousness  of  this  fact,  we  must  note  that 
nowhere  have  paleontologists  found  a  spe- 
cies, genus,  or  other  group  which  has 
passed  away,  afterwards  reinstituted.  It 
thus  seems  to  me  tolerably  clear  that  if 


A    CONDITION  OF  ADVANCE.         183 

any  considerable  step  in  the  progress  of 
the  species  which  held  the  future  of  man 
had  been  omitted,  the  result  would  have 
been  the  failure  of  the  series.  In  a  very 
short  time  the  possible  ancestors  of  our 
species  would  have  departed  from  the  nar- 
row way  in  which  advance  was  possible, 
or  have  been  overcome  by  death,  thus  mak- 
ing a  break  in  the  path  of  our  life,  —  a 
break  which  could  not  have  been  bridged 
over  by  any  variations  which  might  have 
occurred  in  the  collateral  related  forms. 

If  the  foregoing  considerations  have  the 
validity  which  they  seem  to  me  to  possess, 
we  may  fairly  say  that  the  appearance  of 
man  has  depended  upon  the  institution  of 
thousands  of  new  species,  each  of  which 
had  to  appear  at  the  right  time  and  place 
in  order  to  accomplish  the  succession. 
The  question  may  naturally  suggest  itself 
whether,  instead  of  the  peculiar  form  of 
man,  in  case  that  form  had  been  rendered 
impossible  by  a  failure  in  the  chain  of  be- 
ing, another  related  and  perhaps  equally 


1 84    MARCH  OF  THE   GENERATIONS. 

effective  offshoot  might  not  have  appeared 
in  its  stead.  To  this  suggestion,  which 
may  seem  at  first  sight  very  plausible,  the 
geologist  may  make  the  following  answer. 
If  the  system  of  successions  in  species 
had  been  such  as  to  permit  the  replace- 
ment of  the  lost  stem  in  the  growth  which 
led  to  man  by  offshoots  from  collateral 
branches,  we  should  expect  to  find  evi- 
dence of  many  parallel  series  of  organisms 
all  trending  in  the  direction  which  the 
kinship  of  man  has  attained.  It  needs  but 
little  knowledge  of  the  facts  of  paleontol- 
ogy to  show  the  observer  that  such  is  not 
the  case.  Considering  only  the  last  im- 
portant step  in  the  series,  that  which  led 
from  the  anthropoid  level  to  the  estate  of 
man,  we  readily  note  the  fact  that,  although 
there  are  a  number  of  species  still  existing 
which  represent  the  pre-human  state  of 
development,  none  of  them  appear  to  be 
trending  towards  the  human  state.  If  to- 
morrow man  should  disappear  from  the 
planet,  there  is  no  reason  to  suppose  that 


SUMMING   UP.  185 

by  any  process  of  change  a  similar  crea- 
ture would  be  evolved,  however  long  the 
animal  kingdom  continued  to  exist.  Our 
nearest  kindred  among  the  quadrumanous 
animals  are  on  paths  of  development  or 
retrogression  which  give  no  promise  that 
they  will  arrive  at  a  lofty  goal. 

We  may  sum  up  the  foregoing  consid- 
erations as  follows  :  In  the  process  of  or- 
ganic development,  the  first  important  step 
consists  in  the  organization  of  individuals, 
each  of  which  can  gather  experience,  and 
build  the  results  into  a  form  in  which  they 
can  be  transmitted  to  its  successors.  The 
function  of  the  individual  is  thus  accom- 
plished, and  it  then  passes  away  to  make 
room  for  its  offspring.  The  separate  be- 
ings of  the  several  generations  are  gath- 
ered into  associations  of  like  forms,  which 
we  term  species,  each  of  which,  for  a 
greater  or  less  period,  remains  in  a  some- 
what stable  state,  but  usually,  after  a  time, 
by  some  process  of  change  through  selec- 
tion or  other  influences,  alters  its  shape 


1 86    MARCH  OF  THE   GENERATIONS. 

and  reconstructs  itself  in  relation  to  an- 
other assemblage  of  environing  conditions. 
Generally  these  changes  end  in  the  de- 
struction of  the  form  without  any  great 
advance  in  station  having  been  secured. 
Here  and  there  some  influences,  the  na- 
ture of  which  we  cannot  discern  in  the 
present  state  of  our  knowledge,  leads  the 
varying  life  on  pathways  which  are  di- 
rected upward.  In  very  few  cases  have 
these  forms  succeeded  in  attaining  to  the 
plane  of  social  organizations  which  may 
be  termed  elevated,  and  in  only  one  case 
has  a  transcendent  success  been  attained. 
The  success  of  man  has  been  due,  not 
to  any  very  peculiar  accomplishment  of  an 
organic  kind,  for  in  his  frame  he  is  much 
like  his  kindred,  the  anthropoids.  It  has 
been  won  by  an  entire  change  in  the  limi- 
tations of  his  psychic  development.  Until 
we  arrive  at  the  estate  of  man,  the  rate  of 
mental  development  in  the  various  intel- 
lectual animals  is,  on  the  whole,  not  more 
rapid  than  that  of  their  organic  modifica- 


THE  PLACE   OF  HUMANITY.         l8/ 

tions.  In  most  cases  it  seems  limited  by 
the  purely  physical  progress  of  the  several 
forms.  When,  however,  we  come  to  man, 
we  appear  to  find  the  old  bondage  of  the 
mind  to  the  body  swept  away  ;  and  the 
intellectual  parts  develop  with  extraor- 
dinary rapidity,  while  the  frame  remains 
essentially  unchanged.  It  is  in  this  new 
freedom  that  we  find  the  one  dominant 
characteristic  of  man,  the  feature  which 
entitles  us  to  class  him  as  an  entirely  new 
kind  of  animal. 

It  is  safe  to  say  that  there  have  been 
a  hundred  million  species  of  organisms 
developed  on  the  earth  since  life  began  to 
be.  At  the  present  time  there  are  about 
a  million  such  forms  tenanting  this  planet. 
Thus  our  own  species  appears,  from  the 
point  of  view  of  its  supreme  success,  not 
only  most  exceptional,  but  absolutely  alone 
in  the  history  of  this  sphere.  When  this 
peculiarity  in  the  position  of  man  comes 
to  be  well  understood,  when  it  is  dis- 
tinctly seen  that  in  his  case  the  organic 


1 88    MARCH  OF  THE   GENERATIONS. 

order  has  undergone  a  unique  and  com- 
plete revolution,  the  place  of  humanity  in 
the  world  will  begin  to  be  understood. 
The  inquiries  of  biologists,  showing  so 
clearly  the  close  physical  relation  between 
man  and  the  lower  animals,  naturally  led 
to  an  undue  approximation  of  our  own  kind 
to  the  lower  life.  The  evidences  of  psychic 
identity  which  have  been  accumulated 
seemed  at  first  sight  to  affirm  the  rela- 
tion. Many  naturalists  at  the  present 
day  perceive  little  reason  for  making  any 
very  trenchant  division  between  our  own 
kind  and  our  kindred  among  the  higher 
apes.  It  appears  to  me  that  this  classi- 
fication is  overthrown  when  we  consider 
the  curious  emancipation  from  the  domi- 
nance of  the  body  which  man  exhibits. 
He  alone  with  an  unchanged  frame  is  en- 
abled to  undergo  enormous  alterations  in 
the  measure  of  his  intellectual  power,  and 
to  accomplish  these  changes  at  a  rate 
which,  in  a  geologic  sense,  is  exceedingly 
swift. 


ADVANCE  IN*  MENTAL  POWER.      189 

A  reasonable  construction  of  the  facts 
warrants  the  statement  that  the  law  of 
generational  advance  has  in  man  under- 
gone a  sudden,  indeed  we  may  say  a  par- 
oxysmal, alteration  ;  in  truth,  the  most 
startling  change  which  the  history  of  or- 
ganic life  exhibits.  In  the  ongoing  of 
the  generations  before  man,  the  physical 
and  the  psychic  development  went  for- 
ward at  nearly  equal  rates.  In  man  alone 
do  we  find  the  body  remaining  relatively 
invariable,  showing  no  capacity  for  open- 
ing up  new  lines  of  development,  while 
the  intellectual  powers  appear  almost  un- 
limited in  their  possibilities  of  advance. 
It  is  hardly  too  much  to  say  that  the  mea- 
sure of  advance  in  mental  power,  which 
has  been  attained  in  human  kind  and  won 
in  a  few  thousand  years,  exceeds  all  which 
was  accomplished  in  the  tens  of  thousands 
of  species  through  which  our  life  has 
passed  in  its  advance  to  the  estate  of  man. 
The  naturalist  knows  no  miracles  ;  to  him 
this  departure  from  the  old  generational 


1 90    MARCH  OF  THE    GENERATIONS. 

principle  is  a  part  of  the  great  order  of 
events.  Nevertheless,  he  must  confess 
that  there  is  nothing  in  the  history  of  life 
up  to  the  level  of  man,  which  has  met  his 
view,  in  any  way  calculated  to  explain  the 
psychic  freedom  of  our  species,  —  the  ease 
with  which  the  mental  powers  advance 
while  the  bodily  parts  undergo  no  atten- 
dant change. 


CHAPTER  V. 

THE    BOND    OF    THE    GENERATIONS. 

EVERYWHERE  in  organic  nature,  in  ani- 
mals and  plants  alike,  we  find  evidence 
of  certain  similar  needs.  First  of  these 
comes  the  necessity  of  providing  for  the 
sustenance  of  the  creature  by  means  of 
food.  No  sooner  in  the  history  of  the  in- 
dividual is  this  primal  condition  satisfied 
than  the  problem  of  reproduction  has  to 
be  dealt  with.  Here,  as  in  the  matter  of 
nutrition,  the  method  of  dealing  with  the 
question,  though  different  in  the  several 
organic  groups,  exhibits  in  them  all  an  es- 
sential similarity.  The  life  of  the  race  is 
given  for  a  time  into  the  keeping  of  indi- 
viduals, who,  rising  from  the  egg  or  seed, 
try  their  powers  in  the  tasks  of  life,  give 
birth  to  their  successors,  and  then  pass 
away.  Death  is  in  all  cases  accepted  as 


THE  BOND   OF  THE  GENERATIONS. 

a  condition  of  advancement.  The  series 
which  have  attained  the  highest  develop- 
ment have  evidently  won  their  place  in 
good  part  by  organizing  the  method  in 
which  the  old  give  way  to  the  young.  As 
this  system  of  generational  succession  be- 
comes affirmed,  the  difficulties  attendant 
on  the  ever-recurring  return  of  the  life  to 
the  simplicity  of  the  egg,  and  the  dangers 
which  the  feeble  germs  incur,  lead  to  con- 
tinual efforts  to  increase  the  measure  of 
the  help  which  the  parents  may  give  their 
offspring,  and  from  these  efforts  there 
arise  a  host  of  contrivances,  partly  struc- 
tural, partly  instinctive  or  intellectual,  by 
which  the  adult  life  helps  that  which  is 
germinating.  The  last  of  these  great 
structural  advances  were  made  in  the 
mammalian  series ;  the  latest  and  incom- 
parably the  most  important  -of  the  intel- 
lectual gains  which  look  to  this  end  were 
begun,  or  at  least  foreshadowed,  in  the 
lower  groups,  but  were  only  carried  very 
far  in  human  society. 


MOTHER  AND   CHILD.  193 

The  mechanical  gains  of  the  series  of 
animals  whence  man  has  derived  his  frame 
and  the  cardinal  motives  of  his  mind  con- 
sist in  the  development  of  the  milk-glands 
and  teats  in  the  earlier  forms  of  the  group, 
and  the  creation  of  the  placenta  in  the 
later  members  of  the  series.  By  these 
contrivances  the  young  are  enabled  to 
profit  by  the  strength  of  the  mother  until 
they  have  passed  by  the  peculiar  weak- 
nesses of  their  early  development.  By 
these  improvements  in  the  relation  of 
mother  and  child  development  can  be 
maintained  for  a  much  longer  time  than 
in  the  more  primitive  system  of  parental 
relations,  and  thereby  a  greater  measure 
of  advance  is  made  possible.  Vast  as  is 
the  profit  of  these  singular  bonds  between 
the  mother  and  infant,  the  greatest  step 
towards  the  union  of  the  strong  with  the 
weak  is  afforded  by  the  expansion  of  the 
sympathies,  by  the  growth  of  the  affec- 
tion between  the  elders  and  the  young 
of  the  species.  Parental  care  exists  in 


194     THE  BOND.    OF  THE    GENERATIONS. 

many  of  the  lower  forms  of  animals  ;  a 
love  of  the  tribe  is  shown  in  the  social 
insects,  such  as  the  ants  and  bees ;  but 
while  this  is  to  these  lower  beings  at 
once  very  profitable,  and  so  well  developed 
as  to  bring  about  the  formation  of  very 
elaborate  social  systems,  such  as  those  of 
the  ant-hill  and  the  bee-hive,  it  is  only 
in  the  mammalia  and  the  birds  that  the 
family  affection  leads  to  the  formation  of 
tribal  sympathies  which  we  recognize  by 
their  manifestations  to  be  clearly  akin  to 
our  own  motives.  These  altruistic  emo- 
tions are  evidently  valuable  to  creatures 
even  in  groups  far  below  the  level  of  man. 
Considerable  as  is  this  sympathetic  bond 
which  causes  the  leaders  of  the  herding 
mammalia  to  risk  their  lives  for  the  safety 
of  the  weaker  members  of  their  associa- 
tion, in  most  cases  it  leads  only  to  a  cer- 
tain rude  defense  of  the  young  and  the 
females  against  the  assaults  of  the  larger 
beasts  of  prey.  Although  the  danger 
from  this  source  is  by  no  means  unimpor- 


THE  HUSBANDING  HABIT.  195 

taut,  this  is  not  the  exigency  in  which  the 
young  are  in  the  most  constant  need  of 
help.  Their  most  serious  requirement  is 
that  of  food  in  the  season  of  scanty  sup- 
ply. The  husbanding  habit,  though  com- 
mon among  the  insects,  where  it  is  in 
some  cases  most  ingeniously  elaborated, 
is  rare  and  clumsy  in  its  modes  of  action 
among  the  vertebrates.  Curiously  enough 
its  development  among  the  mammals,  save 
in  man,  is  almost  entirely  limited  to  the 
group  of  rodents,  creatures  which  in  other 
regards  than  their  mental  parts  show  no 
features  which  entitle  them  to  high  place 
in  the  class  to  which  they  belong.  In  this 
structurally  rather  inferior  order,  we  find 
nearly  all  the  species  which  have  a  well- 
determined  habit  of  providing' during  the 
summer  or  autumn  against  the  dearth  of 
the  winter  season.  The  squirrels,  rats, 
mice,  but  above  all  the  beaver,  have  the 
custom  of  hoarding  provisions  which  they 
gather  with  laborious  determination  and 
store  away  with  skill.  It  would  be  easy 


196  THE  BOND  OF  THE  GENERATIONS. 

to  show  that  this  habit  depends  in  a  great 
measure  on  the  physical  structure  of  these 
creatures,  which  structure  greatly  favors 
the  resort  to  roots  and  seeds  for  food,  and 
lends  itself  naturally  to  the  formation  of 
an  instinctive  habit  of  storing  these  arti- 
cles in  hoards  for  winter  use.  Except  in 
the  case  of  the  beaver,  this  habit  cannot 
be  deemed  social,  for  the  creatures  make 
the  provision,  each  for  itself  alone,  and 
with  little  reference  to  its  kindred  of  the 
tribe  or  family. 

In  general  among  the  mammals  below 
the  level  of  man,  we  find  only  the  merest 
rudiments  of  a  social  system.  There  is  no 
trace  of  anything  like  institutions  or  spe- 
cial rules  of  conduct,  such  as  create  the 
framework  of  human  society.  We  see 
one  form  of  these  devices  in  the  insects. 
In  that  group,  at  least  among  the  commu- 
nal forms,  habits  are  so  ordered  that  the 
members  of  the  commonwealth  greatly 
aid  each  other  in  the  varied  needs  of  life  : 
some  gather  and  distribute  food ;  others 


SOCIAL  SYSTEM  OF  INSECTS.        197 

provide  for  the  need  of  reproduction  ;  in 
some  cases,  as  in  certain  groups  of  ants, 
yet  other  classes  of  the  society  act  as  sol- 
diers. In  some  of  the  species,  by  a  rude 
process  of  adoption,  feebler  but  indus- 
trious varieties  are  taken  into  the  colony 
and  there  retained  as  slaves.  In  yet  other 
instances  the  ants  cultivate  aphids,  from 
which  they  derive  a  honey-like  secretion. 
They  bear  these  little  animals  to  suitable 
places  on  the  stems  or  branches  of  the 
plants,  and  guard  them  from  enemies. 
Sometimes  the  ants  carry  this  protective 
work  so  far  that  they  inclose  the  aphids 
within  walls  of  clay,  so  that  they  may  be 
secured  from  various  dangers.  But  all 
these  marvelous  things  are  done  by  the 
insects  in  a  purely  formal  way.  They  act 
by  the  mental  process  which  characterizes 
their  class,  and  which  leads  to  deeds  done 
under  the  impulse  of  mere  habit,  in  which 
neither  immediate  sympathy  nor  distinct 
rationality  appears  to  have  any  share  in 
shaping  the  act. 


198     THE  BOND   OF  THE   GENERATIONS. 

The  great  advantage  we  find  in  the 
group  of  mammals  is  that  whatever  may 
be  done  for  the  fellow-being  is  accom- 
plished through  emotions  guided  by  a  sym- 
pathetic understanding  of  the  fellow-crea- 
ture, and  with  a  certain  measure  of  reason 
in  the  act.  It  is  true  that  many  of  these 
actions  become  in  a  way  habitual,  and  all 
tend  to  be  affected  in  this  manner ;  but 
the  ever-increasing  importance  of  ration- 
ality causes  all  the  acts  of  these  mam- 
malian species  to  have  much  higher  intel- 
lectual quality  than  those  of  the  insects. 
When  the  creature  is  moved  to  action,  the 
stimulus  operates  on  the  passions,  and  the 
deed  is  the  expression  of  these  motives. 
It  is  not  accomplished  in  the  automatic 
way  in  which  it  is  brought  about  in  the 
case  of  the  bees  and  ants.  The  effect  of 
this  increase  in  rationality  is  that  as  soon 
as  the  ancient  and  deeply-rooted  sympa- 
thies which  are  firmly  implanted  in  this  se- 
ries of  animals  in  their  age-long  experience 
come  to  be  guided  by  the  higher  intelli- 


A    VAST  ADVANCE.  199 

gence  of  mankind,  the  connection  between 
the  generations  begins  to  be  established 
by  means  of  institutions,  if  by  this  word 
we  may  designate  the  permanent  condi- 
tions which  are  exhibited  in  the  relations 
between  men.  In  place  of  the  vague  and 
incoherent  feeling  for  and  with  the  kin- 
dred, which  we  find  among  the  lower 
mammals,  or  the  formal  and  limited  co- 
operative work  of  the  communal  insects, 
we  have  in  the  social  order  of  our  species 
a  vast  advance  in  the  bond  between  the 
generations,  which  is  effected  through  the 
same  habitual,  but  still  sympathetically 
enlivened,  institutions  which  more  devel- 
oped memory  and  reason  foster. 

First  of  all  we  must  note  the  great  ad- 
vance in  the  care-taking  motives  among 
men.  Foresight,  that  creature  of  the 
memory  and  of  the  constructive  imagina- 
tion, is  scarcely  developed  among  the 
lower  mammals ;  except  in  the  very  special 
instance  of  the  beavers  and  the  other 
lesser  rodents,  there  are  only  rare  in- 


2OO     THE  BOND   OF  THE   GENERATIONS. 

stances  of  forelooking,  such  as  are  ex- 
hibited by  the  herds  of  the  suck-giving 
animals,  who  post  sentinels  to  warn  the 
congregation  when  enemies  approach. 
Thus  this  motive  of  foresight,  on  which 
all  advance  depends,  is  broadly  indicated 
below  the  level  of  man.  But  among  the 
lowest  men  we  find  perhaps  one  hundred 
times  the  capacity  for  anticipating  needs 
which  exists  in  any  of  the  lower  verte- 
brate series.  Even  the  most  primitive 
savages  make  some  deliberate  preparation 
for  the  demands  of  to-morrow  or  the  next 
season  of  dearth.  When  the  Andaman 
islander  or  other  low  savage  shapes  any 
tool,  he  does  his  labor  with  reference  to 
actions  in  the  more  or  less  remote  future  ; 
he  shapes  it  from  his  memory  of  expe- 
riences and  his  expectations  of  actions 
which  he  is  hereafter  to  perform.  With 
all  such  people  there  is  some  husbanding 
of  food,  some  preparation  of  garners. 

Morally  naked  as  these  brutal  men  seem 
to  be,  we  still  find  that  there  exist  among 


RIGHTS  OF  OWNERSHIP.  2OI 

them  the  elements  of  institutions  which 
regulate  the  conditions  of  their  conduct 
towards  each  other.  Although  the  sense 
of  possession,  with  reference  to  property 
in  their  wives,  children,  or  chattels,  is 
often  weak  in  the  lower  grades  of  human 
kind,  there  are  still  some  accepted  princi- 
ples which  determine  the  rights  of  owner- 
ship and  of  inheritance.  These  principles 
are  commonly  founded  on  the  sympathetic 
relations  between  individuals  who  abide 
together  in  the  primitive  family  or  its  later 
product,  the  tribe  or  clan.  At  first  these 
institutions  concerning  property  have  rela- 
tively little  value,  for  there  is  not  much  to 
possess  or  to  inherit,  yet  the  scanty  rai- 
ment and  the  rude  tools  which  the  dying 
leave  are  the  beginnings  of  that  vast  store 
of  hereditaments  which  in  large  measure 
control  the  shape  and  regulate  the  advance 
of  modern  society.  In  the  tribal  state  the 
most  important  bond  between  the  mem- 
bers of  the  society  is  that  which  obliges 
men  to  risk  their  lives  for  the  common 


2O2     THE  BOND  OF  THE   GENERATIONS. 

safety.  Hence  we  have  the  institutions  of 
defense  and  valor  and  obedience  to  the 
chosen  leader,  which  are  so  well  provided 
in  the  early  states  of  society  that  they  re- 
main in  the  traditions  of  civilization  long 
after  the  immediate  needs  which  secured 
their  existence  have  passed  away. 

The  institutions  of  valor  and  loyalty,  the 
first  of  the  moral  bonds  of  society  to  be 
well  affirmed,  were  naturally  among  the 
first  products  of  human  sympathy,  for  on 
their  efficient  action  depends  the  chance 
which  may  be  afforded  to  all  the  other 
motives  of  a  social  sort  to  find  a  place  in 
which  to  take  root. 

Until  a  body  of  people  is  gathered  to- 
gether, bound  in  association  by  a  common 
pride,  and  fended  from  the  assaults  of  their 
enemies  by  the  devotion  of  vassals  and  the 
skill  of  chieftains,  there  is  no  soil  in  which 
the  other  higher  motives  may  find  a  chance 
to  plant  themselves :  hence  these  primal 
forms  of  sympathetic  institutions  are  or 
have  been  of  overwhelming  value  to  hu- 


THE  FEUDAL  SPIRIT.  2O3 

man  interests.  That  which  is,  at  least  in 
its  more  advanced  form,  the  feudal  spirit, 
has  also  certain  very  important  effects  in 
linking  one  generation  to  another.  Under 
it,  as  a  reward  for  valor,  there  arise  cer- 
tain privileges  and  considerations  which 
belong  to  particular  men  ;  in  almost  all 
cases  these  immunities,  on  death,  pass  to 
the  kindred  of  the  man :  hence  we  have  the 
bond  of  the  family  strengthened,  and  at 
the  same  time  there  is  awakened  a  sense 
of  the  principle  of  inheritance,  which, 
though  it  at  first  may  relate  only  to  the 
descent  of  privileges,  comes  in  time  to 
have  a  more  important  meaning.  In  the 
very  lowest  state  of  savagery  there  is  but 
little  consideration  given  to  the  individual 
because  of  his  ancestors,  and  for  a  long 
time  in  the  upward  going,  men  are  valued 
by  their  individual  power  in  action,  rather 
than  for  any  qualities  of  their  ancestors. 
Incidentally,  however,  in  all  social  develop- 
ment the  family  bond,  in  which  the  tribal 
organization  began,  again  most  potently 


2O4     THE  BOND   OF  THE   GENERATIONS. 

asserts  itself  in  a  redivision  of  the  society 
into  households. 

The  social  segmentation  by  means  of 
which  the  gens  arises  within  the  tribe 
marks,  as  nothing  else  does,  the  passage 
from  the  first  to  the  second  stage  of  na- 
tional development.  The  change  from  the 
purely  tribal  compact  or  defensive  condi- 
tion of  the  aggregation  to  that  in  which 
increasing  security  permits  the  social  or- 
der to  obey  the  motives  which  lead  to 
inner  and  more  complete  development, 
would  of  itself  afford  a  most  interesting 
field  for  inquiry.  But  for  our  present 
purpose  we  need  only  to  note  that  the  di- 
vision into  gentes  or  families,  under  the 
common  but  enlarged  and  affirmed  tribal 
authority,  leads  to  the  institution  of  an- 
other and  nearer  bond  between  the  several 
individuals  in  the  several  lines  of  inher- 
itance. Each  of  these  subdivisions,  en- 
dowed with  inheritances  of  privileges  of 
pride  and  of  property,  looks  forward  with 
keen  interest  to  the  successors  in  its  line. 


THE  FAMILY.  2O$ 

These  family  units  are  well-determined 
elements  of  the  nascent  state ;  they  often 
gather  about  them  as  retainers  or  as  slaves 
the  feebler  elements  of  society,  those  who 
have  never  had  ancestors  strong  enough 
to  secure  a  social  place  for  their  stock. 

With  the  next  step  in  the  advancing 
social  order,  the  gentile  system  commonly 
disappears,  and  the  separate  family  rises  in 
dignity  ;  the  measure  of  the  enhancement 
in  the  importance  of  the  household  is  gen- 
erally in  proportion  to  the  degree  in  which 
security  against  external  or  internecine 
danger  has  been  affirmed.  The  status  of 
the  family  is  indeed  the  best  index  of  the 
development  of  law  in  a  society,  for  only 
in  a  well-regulated  state  can  these  sep- 
arate units,  the  families,  be  sufficiently 
protected  to  maintain  themselves,  and  only 
in  such  a  state  can  the  man  be  left  free 
enough  from  other  demands  on  his  alle- 
giance to  do  his  part  as  master  of  a  well- 
organized  household.  The  peculiar  advan- 
tage of  the  limited  family  consists  in  the 


2O6     THE  BOND   OF  THE   GENERATIONS. 

fact  that  it  permits  the  elders  of  a  group, 
in  which  the  affections  are  strong,  to  do 
their  will  in  giving  to  the  children  the 
largest  possible  share  of  the  help  which 
the  adult  members  of  the  society  can  spare 
for  their  nurture.  There  are  not  wanting 
theorists  who  look  upon  the  somewhat  self- 
ish limitation  of  the  exclusive  household 
as  a  damage  to  society  in  general ;  some 
of  them  propose  to  help  the  social  order 
by  turning  the  life  which  is  now  shut  in 
by  the  home  walls  into  the  common  field 
of  national  activity.  Such  people  mistake 
the  essential  position  of  the  home  ;  they 
fail  to  see  that  the  family  is  a  most  per- 
fect contrivance  for  the  difficult  task  of 
conveying  from  parent  to  child  the  varied 
nurture  which  is  necessary  to  lift  the  hu- 
man infant  to  the  state  in  which  it  must 
come  to  its  adult  work.  It  is  the  only 
traversable  bridge  over  which  the  succes- 
sive generations  of  this  vastly  complicated 
being  can  pass  across  the  gap  which  death 
is  ever  making  between  the  individual 


SYSTEMATIC   TEACHING.  2O? 

stages  of  life.  The  width  and  depth  of 
this  interval  increase  with  each  advance 
in  the  status  of  man.  It  is  now  the  most 
serious  of  our  social  problems,  the  more  so 
because  it  is  unseen,  to  lift  the  youth  of 
our  time  to  the  ever  more  exalted  station 
of  our  kind. 

While  the  family  is  to  be  reckoned  as 
the  most  effective  instrument  for  applying 
the  resources  of  society  in  the  task  of  con- 
veying the  social  store  to  the  young,  our 
whole  system  of  schooling,  an  outgrowth 
of  the  household  education,  is  a  later,  and, 
in  the  higher  stages  of  society,  a  very 
important  supplement  to  the  domestic 
work.  The  history  of  systematic  teaching 
is  one  of  the  most  interesting  chapters  in 
the  records  of  civilization.  To  tell  it  in 
a  sufficient  manner  would  require  a  great 
treatise  ;  we  can  only  note  the  outlines  of 
the  story.  All  true  literature  is  the  ex- 
pression of  the  sympathies  ;  it  is  the  pro- 
duct of  those  motives  deeply  stamped  in 
the  mammalian  series,  whence  man  derives 


2O8     THE  BOND  OF  THE  GENERATIONS. 

his  store  of  qualities  which  leads  the  crea- 
ture to  go  out  towards  its  kindred :  first 
towards  its  own  children,  and  then  in  ever- 
widening  circles  to  its  more  distant  rela-t 
tions,  the  other  members  of  the  gens,  the 
tribe,  the  nation,  all  mankind,  and  even  all 
nature.  This,  the  primal  form  of  learn- 
ing, the  product  of  the  affections,  begins 
in  all  cases  with  the  song  or  chant,  in 
which  the  sentiments  receive  the  peculiar 
mould  which  the  metric  impulse  gives  to 
them.  At  first  it  concerns  the  simpler 
motives  of  men :  war,  the  chase,  sexual 
love,  all  of  which  are  primal  interests,  and 
the  very  foundations  of  the  literary  mo- 
tive. As  records  are  developed,  the  task 
of  the  bard  enlarges  ;  as  national  ongoing 
begins,  the  store  of  the  scholar  soon  be- 
comes larger  than  the  household  teaching 
can  impart,  and  in  the  natural  division  of 
labor  a  portion  of  the  task  of  instructing 
is  transferred  to  the  helpers  of  the  house- 
hold labor,  the  teachers,  whereby  it  be- 
comes unfortunately  in  part  severed  from 


THE  PROCESS  OF  ACCUMULATION.    209 

the  sympathetic  motives  which  should 
attend  all  the  work  of  uplifting  the  youth.1 
The  family  and  its  adjunct  —  the  school 
—  are  the  means  whereby  the  store  of 
wealth  of  all  kinds,  that  of  learning  as 
well  as  of  more  material  quality,  is  applied 
to  the  supreme  task  of  uplifting  the  weak 
youth  to  the  strength  of  the  mature.  The 
process  of  accumulation,  extremely  imper- 
fect in  the  primitive  conditions  of  society, 
goes  on  apace  with  each  step  in  the  eco- 
nomic advance.  Among  the  Australian 
savages  or  the  Andaman  Islanders  the 
store  of  goods  of  all  kinds  available  for 
the  nurture  of  the  weak  is  very  small ; 
taking  account  of  the  material  elements 

1  The  decadence  of  value  in  education,  as  it  is  removed 
from  the  household,  —  a  decay  due,  I  believe,  to  the  loss 
of  the  sympathetic  motive,  —  may  be  well  measured  by 
the  effect  on  the  teaching  of  art  which  has  come  from 
the  modern  practice  of  giving  over  all  such  instruction  to 
public  schools.  While  art  work  was  done  in  the  family 
or  in  the  household  workshops,  but  little  removed  from 
the  influences  of  the  hearth,  it  was  more  direct,  more 
appealing  to  man  than  in  its  modern  school  form. 


2IO     THE  BOND   OF  THE   GENERATIONS. 

of  subsistence  alone,  it  is  probably  not  on 
the  average  equal  to  more  than  a  month's 
labor  per  capita  of  the  total  population. 
In  our  most  civilized  states,  counting  all 
the  "plant"  of  civilization,  houses,  roads, 
care  which  has  gone  to  the  improvement 
of  fields,  etc.,  it  is  at  least  one  hundred 
times  as  much  as  among  the  lower  sav- 
ages ;  it  may  indeed  amount  to  a  thousand 
times  that  sum.  Among  the  more  primi- 
tive peoples  there  is  only  a  small  share  of 
human  endeavor  embodied  in  the  intangi- 
ble yet  precious  heritage  of  the  folk  ;  their 
literature,  their  science,  and  their  law  can 
hardly  be  valued  at  a  higher  price  in  terms 
of  labor  than  their  chattels ;  but  in  civil- 
ized states  these  products  of  thought  and 
experience  are  of  incalculable  importance. 
Age  by  age  this  store  has  increased  until 
now  it  has  gone  quite  beyond  the  distrib- 
utive efficiency  of  our  family  or  school 
system  ;  the  very  wealth  of  the  people 
clogs  the  channels  by  which  it  should  find 
its  way  to  the  rising  generation. 


THE   OFFICES  OF  WEALTH.         211 

It  is  an  almost  impossible  task  in  a 
work  such  as  this  to  do  more  than  help 
the  reader's  imagination  to  conceive  the 
vast  harvest  of  good  which  the  race  has 
won,  and  is  constantly  augmenting,  all  of 
which  is  in  effect  a  garment  to  shelter  the 
individual,  a  strong  and  flexible  chain  to 
knit  the  generations  together,  and  thus  to 
unify  mankind.  We  can  clearly  see  how 
vast  is  the  importance  of  the  mechanical 
method  of  binding  the  child  to  the  mother 
through  the  placenta,  by  which  the  young 
is  permitted  to  enjoy  for  a  greater  time 
the  advantages  of  the  mother's  vigor. 
The  great  accumulation  of  disposable 
wealth  which  is  at  the  command  of  hu- 
man society  in  a  certain  broad  way  is  anal- 
ogous to  that  bond  between  the  parent 
and  the  child.  It  connects  the  mental, 
moral,  and  physical  labor  of  the  genera- 
tions in  the  same  effective  way  as  the 
placenta  unites  the  bodily  organization  of 
the  generations  together.  The  devices  of 
capital,  currency,  credit,  wages,  etc.,  are  all 


212     THE  BOND   OF  THE   GENERATIONS. 

means  whereby  this  store  of  inherited 
profit  can  be  made  to  serve  the  needs  for 
which  it  so  admirably  provides.  These 
needs  are,  in  general,  the  maintenance  of 
the  individual  and  the  nurture  of  the 
youth.  The  family  is  the  principal  agent 
in  securing  the  second  and  more  important 
object  accomplished  by  wealth,  namely,  its 
distribution.  With  every  advance  in  so- 
cial structure,  the  share  of  this  store, 
which,  through  the  household,  is  devoted 
to  the  uses  of  the  youth,  is  increased ;  in 
truth,  the  proportion  of  its  gains  which  the 
community  consecrates  to  this  purpose  is 
the  best  possible  measure  of  the  grade  of 
its  organization. 

Although  our  habits  of  thought  inevi- 
tably lead  us  to  consider  the  position  of 
man  as  apart  from  that  of  the  lower  ani- 
mated nature,  it  is  easy  to  see  that  this 
store  of  inheritances,  which  constitutes 
the  moral  and  material  transmittenda  of 
society,  is  essentially  like,  in  all  save  its 
mass,  to  that  which  binds  the  flocks  and 


THE  DESIRE  FOR   UNION.          213 

herds  of  the  lower  life  together;  their 
sympathetic  motives  which  have  led  to 
the  affection  for  children  or  associates  or 
chieftains,  their  friendly  definite  rules  of 
conduct,  their  stores  of  food  when  such 
are  amassed,  are  all  more  than  mere  fore- 
shadowings  of  the  institutions  of  human 
society.  They  all  alike  point  to  the  ac- 
complishment of  the  great  end,  namely, 
the  union,  by  a  community  of  goods,  of 
creatures  which  are  severed  from  each 
other  through  the  law  by  which  the  life  of 
the  species  is  but  temporarily  given  into 
the  keeping  of  individuals.  Thus  while 
nature  recognizes  that  severance  is  neces- 
sary to  success  in  development,  the  part- 
ing is  no  sooner  secured  than  the  reunion 
is  sought  by  every  possible  means.  Great 
as  are  the  gains  in  the  physical  union  of 
the  generations  by  the  food  stored  in  the 
egg,  the  action  of  the  milk  glands  or  the 
placenta,  the  results  brought  about  are 
trifling  compared  with  those  attained  by 
intellectual  processes  which  man  unend- 


214     THE  BOND  OF  THE   GENERATIONS. 

ingly  employs  to  accomplish  the  same  end. 
In  fact,  the  organic  and  the  intellectual 
union  which  the  mammalian  series  ex- 
hibit have  in  many  regards  essentially  dif- 
ferent results.  The  contrivances  of  milk 
glands  and  placenta  serve  to  nourish  the 
young  in  the  more  infantile  period,  and 
thus  lead  it  past  the  difficulties  which  it 
encounters  in  the  first  stages  of  develop- 
ment ;  their  effect  is  to  keep  the  body 
plastic  for  a  longer  time  than  would  other- 
wise be  possible,  and  so  to  favor  a  higher 
physical  and  mental  development.  The  so- 
cial institutions  accomplish  another  end  ; 
they  directly  contribute  to  the  moral  and 
intellectual  nurture  of  the  young  by  giving 
to  them  the  experience  and  acquisitions 
of  their  predecessors. 

So  far  in  this  process  of  developing  the 
social  resources  of  men  or  the  coincident 
task  of  organizing  the  means  whereby 
they  are  distributed,  there  has  been  no 
pervading  rationality,  no  definite  purpose. 
Each  special  part  of  the  work  has,  it  is 


NO  PERVADING  RATIONALITY.      215 

true,  been  done  in  a  more  or  less  conscious 
and  determined  manner,  but  the  great  gen- 
eral effects  have  been  accomplished  in  a 
way  hardly  more  regulated  by  the  con- 
scious will  of  men  than  are  the  processes 
of  the  seasons.  Man  has  acted  to  gratify 
his  momentary  desires,  and  the  ever-ruling 
powers  "have  organized  his  actions  into 
the  assembled  good.  The  tribal  system 
grew  from  that  of  the  family  as  directly 
and  as  simply  as  the  tree  from  its  seed ; 
wealth  followed  from  foresight  and  greed, 
learning  from  curiosity,  law  from  just  but 
momentary  decisions.  These  social  frag- 
ments were  integrated  without  intention. 
They  came  together  to  form  the  bond  be- 
tween the  individuals  and  the  generations, 
with  no  more  of  human  plan  in  the  action 
than  shapes  the  processes  which  unite  the 
child  with  the  mother  in  the  period  before 
its  birth.  It  is  only  when  the  advancing 
curiosity  and  the  organized  inquiry  which 
it  brings  about  lead  men  to  make  re- 
searches into  their  own  mental  states,  that 


2l6     THE  BOND   OF  THE   GENERATIONS. 

the  marvel  of  it  all  appears  to  us.  We 
then  see  that  by  following  his  instincts, 
with  only  a  faint  ray  of  reason  to  guide 
him  in  the  immediate  steps  he  had  to  take, 
man  has  by  his  sympathetic  labor  con- 
structed in  a  nobler  way  the  same  kind  of 
society  which  we  find  in  the  economy  of  a 
sponge  or  coral  colony  or  the  more  intel- 
lectual bond  of  the  ant-hill.  The  humanly 
contrived  society  binds  the  individuals  in 
a  common  life,  insures  the  elevation  of  the 
young,  and  minimizes,  as  far  as  seems  to 
be  possible,  the  evils  which  arise  from  the 
brief  duration  of  the  individual  life.  If  it 
had  been  contrived  with  foresight  to  meet 
the  peculiar  needs,  it  could  not,  so  far  as 
we  can  see,  have  been  better  adjusted  to 
them. 

As  yet  the  break  which  death  makes  in 
the  process  of  being  is  imperfectly  re- 
paired by  these  social  contrivances.  The 
blow  to  the  individual,  the  fear  and  sorrow 
which  it  brings  to  the  sufferer  and  to  those 
who  are  endeared  to  him,  remain  with  only 


THE  ANCIENT  HURT  OF  DEATH.  21  / 

the  limited  assuaging  which  the  highest  of 
social  motives,  religion,  alone  can  afford. 
There  is,  however,  reason  to  hope,  or  it 
may  be  to  expect,  that  through  the  fuller 
understanding  of  the  place  of  the  indi- 
vidual being  in  the  world  there  will  be  a 
further  mitigation  of  this  evil.  When  men 
come  to  feel  how  true  it  is  that  the  life  of 
their  kind  is  the  infinitely  important  matter 
for  care,  and  that  the  individual  is  of  mo- 
ment mainly  as  he  contributes  to  the  sus- 
tenance, defense,  and  elevation  of  the  kind, 
we  may  hope  for  a  new  moral  support  in 
the  trial  which  death  brings.  It  is  through 
the  modern  view  of  science  that  we  come 
to  see  how  this  nature,  which  holds  men 
as  the  body  of  the  mother  does  the  un- 
born child,  has  provided  that  they  spring 
from  the  lower  creatures,  inheriting  their 
motives  and  unfolding  them  into  a  higher 
form,  so  that  in  a  natural  manner  they 
are  endowed  with  the  marvelously  per- 
fect resources  against  the  more  evident 
dangers  which  the  individualizing  of  life 


21 8     THE  BOND   OF  THE    GENERATIONS. 

brings  about.  It  is  now  the  task  of  the 
rational  man  to  take  up  this  work  which 
has  been  done  for  him  by  the  agents  of 
the  older  and  the  outer  nature,  and  to  per- 
fect it  by  the  use  of  his  sympathetic  un- 
derstanding and  his  rational  toil.  Every 
step  he  takes  in  this  magnificent  task  will 
serve  still  further  to  make  him  free  of  the 
evils  of  his  isolation,  and  thus  to  heal  the 
ancient  hurt  of  death ;  for  it  will  lead  him 
further  from  the  consideration  of  self,  in 
which  all  fear  of  death  has  its  origin,  and 
bring  him  more  into  the  enduring  life  of 
his  kind.  When  he  enters  on  this  way  he 
indeed  leaves  death  behind  him. 

It  is  evident  that  there  are  two  ways 
by  which  men  instinctively  seek  to  guard 
themselves  from  the  evils  which  they  ap- 
prehend through  death.  In  one  of  these 
they  find  their  consolation  in  the  hope  of 
a  personal  immortality  which  shall  afford 
them  beyond  the  change  a  chance  to  re- 
sume their  activities,  and  in  due  time  to 
recover  the  associations  which  alone  make 


SACRIFICE   OF  SELF,  2 19 

life  precious.  Although  this  way  leads 
through  hedonistic  fields,  it  lies  in  the 
higher  parts  of  that  sterile  realm,  and  has 
been  to  many  a  path  of  advancement.  The 
other  course,  that  along  which  the  higher 
spirits  travel,  is  altruistic.  It  leads  to  the 
sacrifice  of  the  individual's  interest  in 
himself,  and  to  the  devotion  of  all  his 
thought  to  the  interests  of  his  kind  and 
to  the  purposes  of  his  Maker.  So  far  as 
these  motives  which  lead  to  the  expecta- 
tion of  immortal  personal  life,  or  to  the 
devotion  of  a  man's  powers  to  his  infinite 
or  finite  kindred,  are  matters  of  pure  reli- 
gion, I  pass  them  by.  There  are,  how- 
ever, certain  considerations  of  an  imme- 
diately practical  nature  concerning  which 
the  man  of  science,  as  such,  has  a  right  to 
an  opinion. 

It  is  quite  natural  that  the  strong  hand 
of  death  should  be  manifested  in  our  so- 
cial systems,  for  they  are  but  the  reflex 
of  human  experience,  the  present  account 
of  all  which  has  gone  before  in  the  series 


220     THE  BOND  OF  THE  GENERATIONS. 

of  being  which  has  led  to  their  evolution. 
The  general  conduct  of  every  society,  as 
well  as  that  of  the  individuals  which  com- 
pose it,  is  to  a  great  extent  influenced  by 
traditions  which  have  been  derived  from 
a  remote  past.  In  most  cases  these  cus- 
tomary actions  are  below  the  plane  of 
feeling  and  understanding  which  prevail 
among  the  individuals  in  the  association. 
In  general  we  may  say  that  the  plane  of 
social  action  is  below  the  level  of  its  effec- 
tive elements ;  thus  it  comes,  about  that 
while  the  congeries  of  influences  which 
operate  upon  men  who  dwell  together 
serves  to  elevate  the  inefficient  members 
of  the  association,  it  operates  to  lower  the 
grade  of  action  of  those  who  do  the  work 
of  advance.  Therefore  society  needs  a 
constant  revision  in  order  that  we  may 
weed  out  the  customs  and  the  traditions 
on  which  they  are  founded,  that  serve  to 
retard  the  upward  going  of  men. 

Considering  our  social  system  with  ref- 
erence to  the  impress  which  death  has 


MORTUARY  EVILS.  221 

made  upon  it,  we  at  once  note  certain  ob- 
servances which  are  the  relics  and  results 
of  a  state  of  mind  much  lower  than  that 
which  exists  among  the  better  spirits  of 
our  own  time.  The  first  of  these  mortu- 
ary evils  which  we  may  note  is  found  in 
the  excessive  grief  for  the  dead  which  so 
extensively  prevails  even  among  people 
who  are  religious-minded ;  that  is,  who 
should  look  with  perfect  confidence  upon 
the  order  of  events  in  which  they  are 
placed.  It  is  difficult  to  overestimate  the 
gravity  of  the  burden  which  grief  imposes 
on  mankind.  The  injuries  which  it  brings 
arise  in  part  from  the  essentially  selfish 
direction  of  the  energy  of  the  person  who 
indulges  in  sorrow  which  leads  to  the  deg- 
radation of  the  individual  mind,  and  partly 
from  the  loss  which  is  thus  brought  about 
in  the  altruistic  motives  which  alone  can 
advance  the  moral  culture  of  the  people. 
The  evil  of  grief  is  enhanced  by  the  fact 
that  like  all  the  other  emotions  it  is  read- 
ily accumulated  by  inheritance.  The  ten- 


222     THE  BOND   OF  THE   GENERATIONS. 

dency  to  excessive  sorrow  is  probably 
among  the  more  transmissible  of  human 
qualities.  The  result  is  that  the  unhappy 
state  of  mind  is  handed  on  from  genera- 
tion to  generation,  and  maintains  itself 
against  all  the  corrective  influences  which 
religion  and  philosophy  should  bring  into 
action.  Here  and  there  it  is  true  that 
we  find  individuals  who  have  in  a  measure 
escaped  from  this  burden  of  sorrow,  but 
.as  a  whole  the  corrective  influence  of  our 
higher  thinking  has  had  but  little  effect  in 
lightening  the  load  of  grief  which  death 
inflicts. 

The  customs  connected  with  our  dispo- 
sition of  the  dead  are  well  calculated,  not 
only  to  maintain  this  burden,  but  to  in- 
crease the  tax  which  it  imposes  on  society. 
The  costs  of  inhumation  are  often  greater 
than  those  incurred  in  the  education  of  an 
individual ;  the  cemeteries,  at  least  those 
about  our  great  cities,  generally  represent 
a  much  greater  expenditure  than  do  the 
schools  of  the  people.  Thus  the  cost  of 


EDUCATIONAL  ASPECTS..  22$ 

the  property  contained  in  the  cemetery 
of  Mt.  Auburn  is  probably  as  great  as  that 
of  Harvard  College.  It  is  many  times  as 
great  as  that  involved  in  all  the  school- 
buildings  belonging  to  the  people  who- 
bury  their  dead  in  that  cemetery.  As  this 
is  somewhat  of  a  digression  from  the  main 
path  of  this  essay,  we  may  not  consider  it 
further.  It  will,  however,  be  clear  to  all 
considerate  people  that  our  methods  with 
the  dead  not  only  do  violence  to  our  judg- 
ment as  to  the  place  of  death  in  the  world, 
but  also  withdraw  from  the  living  the  help 
which  they  should  receive  from  their  fel- 
low-men. 

We  now  turn  to  consider  the  educa- 
tional aspects  of  the  matter  which  we 
have  in  hand.  The  question  is,  in  what 
way  and  to  what  extent  our  knowledge 
concerning  the  development  of  life  can  be 
made  to  elevate  the  thought  and  action 
of  man.  It  is  clear  that  the  conception 
concerning  the  place  of  the  individual 
human  being  in  the  society  to  which  he 


224    THE  BOND  OP  THE   GENERATIONS. 

belongs  may  be  vastly  improved  by  this 
larger  understanding  of  his  relations  which 
science  affords.  It  is  also  clear  that  it 
would  be  a  difficult  matter  to  bring  the 
ideas  home  to  the  people.  When  the 
teacher  essays  this  task,  he  at  once  finds  a 
difficulty  arising  from  the  large  and  inde- 
finable character  of  the  knowledge  which 
has  to  be  presented  to  the  pupil  before  the 
moral  value  of  the  teaching  can  be  se- 
cured. Few  indeed  among  our  naturalists 
are  led  to  take  a  moral  view  of  the  facts 
which  their  domain  affords.  If,  therefore, 
the  educative  value  of  the  truth  concern- 
ing the  history  of  organic  life  depended 
upon  a  system  of  teaching  which  would 
give  the  mass  of  our  people  any  consid- 
erable part  of  the  learning  on  which  our 
conclusions  rest,  we  might  well  doubt  its 
value  in  general  education. 

Fortunately  for  those  who  would  set 
forth  clearly  to  all  men  the  important 
truths  of  any  science,  there  exists  among 
all  people  a  singular  capacity  for  adopting 


EPIGRAMMATIC   TEACHING.         22$ 

conclusions  which  they  take,  not  by  the 
way  of  detailed  knowledge,  but  through 
maxims  which  present  in  a  condensed 
form  the  essence  of  complicated  truths. 
Almost  all  the  useful  lore  which  influ- 
ences the  masses  of  society  secures  its 
effective  presentation  in  this  epigram- 
matic form.  So  long  as  learning  remains 
in  the  shape  in  which  the  investigator 
uses  it,  it  is  generally  useless  to  the  unini- 
tiated in  the  science.  It  is  only  when  the 
poet  does  his  work,  when  he  phrases  the 
truth  in  a  form  to  appeal  to  the  imagina- 
tion, or  the  more  prosaic  litterateur  in 
a  kindred  way  adapts  the  statement  to 
ordinary  understandings,  that  the  public 
has  a  profit  from  the  inquiry.  A  good 
instance  of  the  way  in  which  a  recondite 
conclusion  of  science  may  be  brought 
home  to  a  people  and  greatly  influence 
their  thought  and  action  may  be  found 
in  the  popular  history  of  the  Darwinian 
hypothesis.  The  currency  of  this  view 
beyond  the  limits  of  the  professional  natu- 


226     THE  BOND   OF  THE  GENERATIONS. 

ralists  is  mainly  due  to  its  happy  expres- 
sion in  Mr.  Spencer's  phrase,  "  the  survival 
of  the  fittest."  The  term  "natural  selec- 
tion," though  a  more  consistent  and  logi- 
cal expression  of  Mr.  Darwin's  main  result, 
is  purely  scientific,  and  could  never  have 
had  much  meaning  to  the  masses  of  men. 
It  is  evident  that  we  cannot  expect 
much  moral  influence  from  science  until 
its  truths  have  obtained  a  currency  which 
can  alone  be  given  them  through  the  chan- 
nels of  sympathetic  understanding.  They 
must  enter  into  that  humanized  body  of 
knowledge  which  constitutes  literature. 
It  appears  to  me  that  the  moral  value  of 
this  learning  cannot  well  be  conveyed 
through  our  ordinary  schools.  The  trend 
of  the  work  done  by  these  institutions 
appears  to  be  steadily,  and  perhaps  inev- 
itably, towards  other  and  more  immediate 
ends.  In  our  universities,  it  is  true,  there 
is  fit  time  and  place  for  the  teacher  of  sci- 
ence to  direct  the  attention  of  the  student 
to  the  moral  aspects  of  his  inquiries.  Yet 


MORAL    TRUTHS  OF  SCIENCE.       22*J 

even  there,  as  my  own  experience  clearly 
indicates,  this  important  task  cannot  de- 
mand much  of  the  teacher's  attention.  He 
necessarily  feels  that  his  main  duty  is  to 
present  the  truth  in  a  purely  scientific 
manner.  A  part  of  the  work  which  has 
to  be  done  in  order  to  bring  the  moral 
aspects  of  science  before  the  public  may 
be  accomplished,  indeed  is  now  being  in  a 
measure  done,  by  those  writers,  such  as 
Mr.  Spencer,  who  without  much  detailed 
knowledge  of  nature  possess-  quick  under- 
standings and  the  literary  faculty  which 
enables  them  to  shape  their  knowledge  for 
the  needs  of  the  ordinary  man.  Good  as 
much  of  this  work  is,  it  appears  to  me 
incompetent  to  effect  the  end  we  have  in 
view.  The  experience  of  the  ages  clearly 
shows  that  the  inculcation  of  moral  truths 
can  only  be  successfully  effected  in  the  per- 
sonal way.  The  instilling  of  such  truths 
seems  to  demand  the  immediate  influence 
of  a  personality.  The  weight  of  the  im- 
pression depends  upon  the  voice  and  the 


228     THE  BOND   OF  THE   GENERATIONS. 

eye  of  a  teacher,  and  upon  that  indescrib- 
able atmosphere  which  surrounds  those 
who  lead  the  conduct  of  men.  On  this 
account  we  are  led  to  look,  for  the  inculca- 
tion of  those  scientific  conclusions  which 
concern  morals,  to  the  class  of  teachers  to 
whom  for  ages  the  specific  moral  educa- 
tion of  society  has  been  committed. 

I  am  aware  that  the  foregoing  proposi- 
tion, that  instruction  in  those  truths  of 
natural  science  which  are  of  most  concern 
to  the  masses  of  men  should  be  left  to 
the  order  of  pastors,  will  not  commend 
itself  to  most  naturalists.  They  will  gen- 
erally apprehend  that  such  a  channel  of 
presentation  will  lead  to  very  distorted 
statements,  in  which  the  natural  facts  will 
be  warped  to  suit  the  exigencies  of  partic- 
ular creeds.  It  may  be  confessed  that  this 
fear  is  reasonable.  In  answer  to  this  ob- 
jection we  should  consider  the  following 
points :  Out  of  the  necessities  of  their 
situation  men  have  determined  that  their 
moral  conduct  shall  be  supervised  by  a 


PASTORS  AS   TEACHERS.  22Q 

body  of  clergy.  No  one  who  acquires  a 
reasonably  good  conception  of  the  condi- 
tions of  society  can  expect  a  state  of  the 
social  order  in  which  these  care-takers  of 
conduct  will  cease  to  have  their  appointed 
work  to  do.  To  this  clergy  naturally  falls 
the  task  of  disseminating  and  inculcat- 
ing moral  truth.  We  cannot  imagine  the 
division  of  their  functions  between  two 
classes  of  men,  the  one  dealing  with  the 
moral  considerations  which  are  founded  on 
religious  creeds,  and  the  other  with  those 
which  are  contributed  by  natural  science. 
Such  a  division  of  labor  would  be  prepos- 
terous. 

It  is  impossible  to  foresee  the  steps  by 
which  this  practical  unification  of  science 
and  religion  may  be  brought  about.  It 
is  clear  that  the  way  which  leads  to  it  is 
long  and  the  obstacles  are  many,  but  the 
result  appears  inevitable.  Although  the 
endeavor  to  forecast  the  process  by  which 
the  facts  of  science  which  affect  the  con- 
duct of  life  may  become  embodied  with 


230     THE  BOND   OF  THE   GENERATIONS. 

our  older  moral  teaching  would  be  futile, 
there  are  certain  considerations  concern- 
ing the  matter  which  we  have  at  this  time 
to  face.  It  is  clearly  necessary  that  our 
clergy  should  be  so  far  informed  concern- 
ing the  truths  which  natural  science  af- 
fords that  they  may  at  once  proceed  with 
their  use.  This  duty  is  the  more  imme- 
diate for  the  reason  that  the  general  pub- 
lic, even  in  the  less  educated  parts  of  our 
society,  already  begin  to  perceive  that  the 
new  learning  has  a  moral  aspect ;  they  are 
indeed  making  a  rude  and  half-informed 
use  of  these  new  acquisitions.  Thus  in 
the  case  of  the  maxim  "the  survival  of 
the  fittest,"  the  half-conceived  idea  leads 
many  persons  to  the  pernicious  corollary 
that  whatever  is,  is  right,  or  to  the  less 
objectionable,  but  utterly  erroneous  no- 
tion, that  the  forces  of  the  environing 
nature  will  of  themselves  alone  secure 
moral  advancement.  Moreover,  certain 
half  -  conceptions  of  scientific  truth  are 
leading  men  to  regard  their  individuality 


IMPORTANCE   OF  THE  INDIVIDUAL.  23! 

as  unimportant.  The  naturalist  alone,  how- 
ever he  may  labor  within  his  appointed 
field,  can  never  hope  to  show  to  men  the 
moral  significance  of  their  personality, 
which  is  disclosed  by  his  peculiar  inqui- 
ries, and  which  can  be  made  vastly  to  rein- 
force our  ancient  canons  of  conduct.  It 
is  for  the  preacher  to  bear  in  upon  men 
the  fact  that  each  person  is  the  keeper  of 
all  the  good  which  with  infinite  toil  and 
pains  has  been  won  by  the  generations  of 
life  which  have  led  to  the  estate  of  man. 


CHAPTER  VI. 

THE    NATURAL   HISTORY    OF   SYMPATHY. 

THE  mental  qualities  which  we  term 
altruistic  are  those  instinctive  emotions 
which  lead  the  mind  to  actions  which 
have  no  relation  to  personal  gratification, 
but  on  the  contrary  involve  some  subjuga- 
tion of  the  immediate  desires  of  the  self. 
Every  intelligent  student  of  mental  phe- 
nomena has  recognized  the  extreme  diffi- 
culty which  is  encountered  in  the  effort  to 
explain  the  origin  of  these  motives.  Self- 
ishness, or  hedonism,  in  all  its  moods,  is 
readily  explained.  As  long  as  the  mind 
inclines  to  do  those  things  which  bring 
immediate  profit  in  the  gratification  of 
personal  desires,  its  action  is  within  the 
limits  which  we  term  natural ;  but  when 
the  emotions  lead  to  self-sacrifice,  which 
can  have  no  reference  to  profit,  to  acts 


THE  MYSTERY  OF  ALTRUISM.      233 

which  have  their  satisfaction  in  unprofit- 
ableness, the  observer  is  at  a  loss  for  an 
explanation.  All  students  of  the  mind 
have  more  or  less  clearly  perceived  the 
essential  mystery  of  altruism.  Kant  found 
it  insoluble.  Schopenhauer  sets  forth  the 
problem  in  the  beginning  of  his  essay  on 
the  foundation  of  morality  (Die  Grund- 
lage  der  Moral)  with  delightful  clearness,, 
and  then  wraps  it  in  his  cold  fog  of  pes- 
simism. A  score  of  other  students  have 
wrestled  with  the  problem,  have  seen  its  esr 
sential  mystery,  but  have  left  it  as  obscure 
as  they  found  it.  No  one  who  has  consid- 
ered this  question  can  doubt  that  of.  all 
metaphysical  problems,  it  is  the  one  which 
needs  the  most  light.  Any  student  is  jus- 
tified in  making  the  almost  inevitable  fail- 
ure which  he  sees  must  await  his  efforts 
to  clear  the  doubts  away.  The  importance 
of  altruism  is  vastly  increased  by  the  fact 
that  it  "is  here  that  religion  finds  its  founda- 
tions in  the  nature  of  man.  It  is  because 
the  mind  of  man  is  altruistic,  because  it 


234    NATURAL  HISTORY  OF  SYMPATHY. 

goes  out  to  his  fellows,  to  the  world  of 
phenomena  which  lies  beyond  his  appe- 
tites, or  yet  further  to  that  realm  which 
lies  beyond  the  visible  world,  that  religion 
exists  or  duty  finds  a  chance  to  be. 
/  As  long  as  man  was  looked  upon  as 
independently  created,  as  long  as  he  was 
regarded  as  a  thing  outside  of  the  other 
life  of  the  world,  the  naturalist  had  no 
reason  to  consider  the  question  of  altruism 
as  within  his  province.  But  the  modern 
advance  in  the  theory  of  life  has  made  it 
perfectly  clear  that  man  is,  in  all  his  parts, 
both  physical  and  mental,  the  last  term  in 
an  organic  series  which  has  led  in  an  un- 
broken succession  of  links  from  the  lowest 
forms  of  life  to  his  present  estate.  This 
brings  the  question  clearly  within  the 
province  of  the  naturalist,  and  gives  him 
a  right  to  take  a  part  in  the  study  of  the 
altruistic  motive. 

Before  we  undertake  to  see  what  aid  the 
naturalist  can  give  in  this  inquiry,  let  us 
examine  a  little  more  closely  into  the 


THE  PHENOMENA   OF  ALTRUISM.    235 

facts ;  let  us  see  in  a  rapid  way  what 
classification  can  be  made  in  the  phenom- 
ena of  altruism.  Thus  we  shall  set  the 
problem  clearly  before  our  minds.  Defin- 
ing altruism  as  the  unselfish  expenditure 
of  mental  power  upon  things  outside  of 
the  limits  of  individuality,  an  expenditure 
made  with  no  reference  to  the  organic 
needs  of  the  individual,  we  give  to  the 
word  a  wider  connotation  than  is  com- 
monly assigned  to  it.  In  the  ordinary  use 
of  the  word,  sympathy  is  regarded  as  an 
affection  pertaining  to  one's  fellow-men 
alone ;  but  if  we  look  closely  we  see  that 
it  includes  in  many  modern  minds  a  pre- 
cisely similar  emotion  toward  all  those 
animals  which  can  be  conceived  of  feeling 
as  men  feel.  Following  it  further,  we  see 
that,  with  some  variation  in  intensity,  it 
includes  the  love  of  nature.  There  is,  it 
seems  to  me,  only  a  difference  in  degree 
and  in  certain  minor  concomitants  be- 
tween the  emotion  with  which  we  caress 
a  dog  and  that  we  experience  when  we 


236    NATURAL  HISTORY  OF  SYMPATHY. 

enjoy  a  beautiful  landscape.  The  essen- 
tial feature  in  both  is  the  going  out  of  the 
mind  into  the  field  of  life  beyond  itself  ; 
so  it  is  with  the  impulse  to  religion.  Dif- 
fering widely  from  the  other  forms  of  sym- 
pathy in  its  mixture  of  motives,  it  is  still 
essentially  altruistic  ;  but  for  the  personal 
motive  of  sympathy,  that  outward  going  of 
the  mind,  it  could  not  exist. 

These  three  forms  of  the  altruistic  mo- 
tive, namely,  the  sympathy  with  the  fellow- 
man,  the  sympathy  with  nature,  and  the 
sympathy  with  the  Infinite,  have  very  dif- 
ferent degrees  of  intensity,  and  are  other- 
wise divisible  from  each  other  in  many 
ways.  Sympathy  with  the  fellow-man  is 
the  most  intense  of  the  three.  It  is  the 
simplest  form  of  the  motive  ;  it  may  ex- 
ist with  less  admixture  of  related  motives 
than  the  other  divisions  of  altruistic  im- 
pulses. It  is  the  most  universal  among 
men,  and  the  most  frequently  active  in 
any  mind.  Moreover,  as  we  shall  here- 
after see,  it  is  the  form  of  this  instinct 


DEGREES  OF  INTENSITY. 

that  we  can  trace  among  the  lower  ani- 
mals. 

The  impulse  to  sympathy  with  the  Infi- 
nite or  with  a  God  is  next  in  intensity,  but 
in  its  quality  very  much  less  simple  and 
unmixed  than  that  with  the  fellow-man  ; 
while  the  sympathy  with  nature,  the  out- 
going of  the  mind  to  the  world  of  life, 
organic  and  physical,  is  the  least  intense 
of  all.  This  last  is  a  mode  of  altruism  that 
is  essentially  modern  in  origin,  and  as  yet 
has  but  slight  effect  upon  most  minds. 
The  love  of  nature  seems  to  be  not  only 
a  motive  of  modern  days,  but  it  appears 
to  be  mainly  limited  to  the  Aryan  people. 
It  is  not  unlikely  that  it  is  in  effect  an 
overflowing  of  the  sympathies  which  were 
originally  developed  in  our  kind,  by  the 
love  of  kindred,  of  chieftains,  or  of  the 
Supreme.  In  the  progress  of  social  devel- 
opment, we  can,  in  a  general  way  at  least, 
trace  the  stages  of  development  from  the 
more  primal  conditions  of  the  altruistic 
motives,  to  the  more  developed  form  in 


238    NATURAL  HISTORY  OF  SYMPATHY. 

which  they  now  find  a  place  in  the  minds 
of  the  more  cultivated  men. 

These  facts  lead  the  naturalist  to  regard 
the  sympathy  with  the  fellow-being  as 
probably  the  original  form  of  all  the 
modes  of  altruism,  the  others  being  of 
later  origin  in  the  process  of  development 
of  this  motive  in  the  animal  life  below 
the  level  of  man.  Anything  which  he 
can  discover  which  will  throw  light  on 
the  conditions  under  which  this  altruistic 
motive  had  its  origin  will,  he  may  be 
sure,  be  a  welcome  contribution  to  the 
matter. 

Before  we  undertake  this  inquiry,  let  us 
notice  the  fact  that,  although  the  evolu- 
tion of  altruism  is  a  matter  which  lies  well 
within  the  province  of  the  naturalist,  it 
belongs  to  a  class  of  questions  that  he  is 
not  well  fitted  to  examine.  The  organic 
world  has  two  distinct  realms  :  the  one 
includes  the  vast  assemblage  of  specific 
forms,  —  visible,  tangible  bodies,  explain- 
ing themselves  to  the  senses,  and  afford- 


ANIMAL  MIND.  239 

ing  an  infinite  field  for  the  employment  of 
all  the  observer's  skill  of  eye  and  hand; 
the  other  realm  is  that  of  mental  parts. 
Here  the  field  of  observation  is  as  shad-  \ 
owy  and  perplexed  as  it  is  evident  and 
clear  in  the  physical  realm.  That  which 
the  naturalist  sees  of  animal  mind  he  sees 
at  an  immense  disadvantage.  In  the  first 
place  he  cannot  perceive  the  mind  of  any 
being  directly  ;  he  can  only  infer  the  men- 
tal constitution  of  the  creature  from  its 
acts,  and  these  acts  are  performed  by 
parts  that  are,  in  most  cases,  utterly  un- 
like those  with  which  he  is  accustomed  to 
see  emotions  expressed.  It  is  only  when 
the  creatures  belong  in  the  upper  part  of 
the  animal  kingdom  and  are  akin  to  him- 
self in  the  nature  of  their  emotions  and 
their  modes  of  expression,  that  he  can  at- 
tain much  certainty  in  his  observations. 
Moreover,  the  whole  training  of  the  nat- 
uralist, as  it  is  now  pursued,  tends  to 
blind  him  to  the  observation  of  such  ob- 
scure things  as  the  mental  phenomena  of 


240    NATURAL  HISTORY  OF  SYMPATHY. 

nature.  Every  pursuit,  if  it  become  de- 
voted to  its  ends,  creates  an  idol  of  preju- 
dice in  the  mind.  With  the  naturalist  it 
is  the  idol  of  clearness,  what  we  might 
perhaps  better  call  the  idol  of  evident  fact, 
that  is  created.  Accustomed  to  see  all 
with  which  he  deals,  the  invisible  is  sure 
to  be  with  him  the  non-existent.  Every 
now  and  then  some  experience  tells  him 
that  the  invisible  element  in  the  operation 
of  this  life  is  really  greater  than  the  visi- 
ble element.  He  sees,  for  instance,  the 
little  transparent  sphere  of  the  egg,  ap- 
parently no  more  specialized  than  a  small 
bit  of  calf  s-foot  jelly,  yet  he  knows  that 
it  is  charged  with  the  history  and  the 
profit  of  a  hundred  million  years  of  life, 
which  it  will  hand  down  to  the  beings 
which  are  to  come  from  it.  Despite  these 
lessons,  which  he  may  have  at  any  hour 
of  his  work,  the  naturalist  must  bow  before 
the  matter-of-fact,  and  shun  this  indefinite 
field.  His  life  must  be  in  the  open  day 
of  plainly  seen  things.  There  are  few 


BEGINNING  OF  MENTAL  POWERS.  241 

naturalists,  and  those  mainly  of  the  class 
that  did  not  enter  on  the  study  of  zoology 
by  the  anatomical  path,  who  have  shown 
any  skill  in  the  study  of  the  mental  parts 
of  animals.  With  these  limitations  well 
in  mind,  we  may  enter  on  the  inquiry  into 
the  natural  history  of  altruism,  free  from 
any  over-expectation  of  the  results  that 
may  be  attained. 

It  is  not  possible  to  determine  where- 
abouts in  the  ascending  scale  of  animal 
life  the  mental  powers  began  to  exist. 
The  lowest  organized  creatures  that  we 
may  safely  term  animals  are,  to  our  senses, 
only  shapeless,  tiny  bits  of  jelly,  transpar- 
ent, with  no  trace  of  organs  of  any  de- 
scription. They  move  by  protruding  the 
semi-fluid  mass  on  one  side  and  drawing 
it  in  on  the  other ;  they  feed  by  rolling 
themselves  around  the  bit  of  food,  absorb- 
ing its  nutriment  into  their  body,  and  then 
rolling  their  elastic  forms  away  from  the 
undigested  matter  ;  and  they  reproduce  by 
a  simple  division  of  the  body.  Of  one  in- 


242    NATURAL  HISTORY  OF  SYMPATHY. 

dividual  we  may  make  two  or  ten  by  divid- 
ing it  with  a  knife,  and  each  bit  will  accept 
the  separate  existence  with  no  shock  to  the 
organism.  Yet  it  is  difficult  to  watch  these 
creatures  without  forming  the  opinion 
that  they  have  some  mode  of  mind  in 
them.  Their  acts  seem  to  involve  voli- 
tion ;  they  may  be  automatic,  yet  some 
mental  quality  must  be  the  governor  of 
the  automatism. 

There  is  a  whole  sub-kingdom  —  the 
protozoa  —  which  shows  little  structural 
advance  on  the  primitive  simplicity  of  its 
lower  members.  Individuals  learn  the  art 
of  combining  themselves  into  associations 
that  build  wonderful  communities,  such 
as  our  sponges ;  but  nowhere  in  them  do 
we  find  the  mark  of  mental  habits.  If 
there  be  anything  like  a  mind  in  their 
level  of  life,  it  must  be  limited  to  the  sim- 
plest reflection  of  desires,  and  to  a  volition 
which  gives  activities  for  their  gratifica- 
tion. The  next  step  higher,  we  find  our- 
selves among  the  radiated  animals.  Here, 


MENTAL  HABITS.  243 

at  the  outset,  a  great  advance  in  machin- 
ery for  sentiency  is  developed.  There  is 
a  nervous  system ;  there  are  the  begin- 
nings of  sight  and  touch  organs.  The 
machinery  of  the  nerves  thus  begins  to 
recognize  the  existence  of  an  outer  world, 
from  which  impressions  are  to  be  gained, 
which  may  guide  the  life  of  the  individ- 
ual. Still  these  impressions  must  be  of 
the  dimmest  sort.  The  life  is  gathered 
within  the  walls  of  the  animal.  There  is 
hardly  more  than  the  faintest  mental  reac- 
tion of  the  creature  upon  the  outer  world. 
One  great  advance  the  creatures  in  the 
highest  group  of  the  radiates  effect.  They 
discover  the  art  of  moving  in  a  definite  di- 
rection over  the  sea  bottom  in  such  a  way 
that  the  head,  or  the  part  that  bears  the 
most  important  sense  organs,  is  foremost 
in  the  advance.  This  organization  of  the 
body,  in  such  a  manner  that  the  motion  is 
in  a  determined  axis,  and  the  instruments 
of  perception  at  its  anterior  end,  is  replete 
with  momentous  consequences  to  animal 


244    NATURAL  HISTORY  OF  SYMPATHY. 

life.  It  determines  that  the  means  of  cog- 
nition shall  not  be  distributed  over  the 
whole  periphery  of  the  body,  but  shall  be 
concentrated  at  the  point  where  they  can, 
in  the  main,  alone  do  effective  work.  Only 
with  something  like  a  head,  with  its  instru- 
ments of  sensation,  and  of  action  with  ref- 
erence to  that  sensation,  can  the  creature 
begin  to  understand  its  environment,  and 
to  reconcile  itself,  by  its  activities,  to  its 
conditions. 

In  the  group  of  mollusca,  which  is  yet 
higher  in  the  scale  of  living  beings,  the 
intellectual  machinery  is  greatly  advanced. 
The  nervous  system  becomes  well  devel- 
oped in  the  highest  forms  ;  in  the  cuttle- 
fishes, there  is  something  like  a  brain,  a 
well-developed  eye,  which,  unlike  the  lower 
eyes  that  give  only  a,  sense  of  light  and 
darkness,  affords  a  distinct  image,  as  our 
eyes  do  ;  a  sense  of  touch,  and  a  sense  of 
hearing.  With  this  advance  in  the  means 
whereby  mental  contact  with  the  outer 
world  is  secured,  there  is  a  proportionate 


CARE   OF  OFFSPRING.  24$ 

gain  in  the  mental  power.  The  creature 
is  no  longer  locked  within  itself.  The 
squid,  at  least,  among  the  mollusca  is  one 
of  the  most  acutely  sensitive  animals.  Im- 
pressions from  the  outer  world  are  received 
by  its  organism  and  expressed  in  its  ac- 
tions as  well  as  they  are  in  the  true  fishes. 
It  is  noteworthy  as  the  lowest  animal 
which  shows  anything  of  these  ready  reac- 
tions upon  the  outer  world.  Curiosity  and 
fear  are  certainly  indicated  in  its  move- 
ments, and  some  of  its  acts  seem  to  show 
rage  as  well. 

Among  the  higher  groups  of  mollusca 
we  begin  to  find  actions  which  are  related 
to  the  care  of  the  offspring.  The  mother 
seeks  the  place  for  the  nest  with  care  and 
deposits  her  eggs,  often  with  extraordi- 
nary precautions.  Although  this  care-tak- 
ing is  in  a  way  mechanical  or  organic,  it 
represents  the  beginning  of  parental  af- 
fection, which,  like  all  the  other  of  our 
moral  and  intellectual  gains,  has  its  roots  in 
the  lower  unconscious  world.  The  organic 


246    NATURAL  HISTORY  OF  SYMPATHY. 

forethoughts  with  reference  to  the  protec- 
tion of  the  young,  which  are  found  in  the 
history  of  many  marine  gasteropods,  ex- 
ceed in  complication  any  contrivances 
which  are  known  to  us  in  the  higher 
realms  of  life. 

Although  in  the  mollusca  we  find  no 
traces  of  sympathy,  we  may  say  that  its 
highest  members  show  that  they  have  ad- 
vanced to  a  point  where  there  is  a  keen 
consciousness  of  an  outer  world,  so  that 
the  necessary  foundations  for  altruism  are 
there  indicated. 

Turning  now  to  another  series  of  organic 
forms,  the  articulates,  we  find  the  most 
rapid  and  wonderful  advances  toward  in- 
tellectual powers.  The  three  other  and 
lower  groups  of  animals,  protozoans,  radi- 
ates, and  mollusca,  have  types  of  structure 
that  do  not  well  admit  of  sense  organs  or 
the  machinery  for  the  use  of  volition ;  but 
beginning  with  the  lowest  articulates  we 
find  a  many-jointed  body  provided  with  a 
well-developed  nervous  system,  elaborating 


ADVANCE  IN  PERCEPTION.          247 

mechanisms  for  receiving  sensations  and 
numerous  means  for  executing  the  behests 
of  the  will.  Already  in  the  Crustacea,  or 
in  the  middle  part  of  the  group  of  articu- 
lates, we  find  nimble  bodies  and  keen 
senses,  showing  that  the  animal  has  be- 
come capable  of  an  alert  perception  of 
the  outer  world.  Among  the  insects  this 
advance  is  completed  as  far  as  the  articu- 
late series  goes.  Our  familiar  experience 
with  many  forms  of  insect  life  shows  us 
how  quick  is  this  reaction  of  the  mental 
parts  upon  the  outer  world.  Observe  a 
spider  or  a  wasp  with  its  prey,  or  the  bees 
at  work  in  a  hive.  What  could  show  a 
more  complete  perception  of  environment 
than  their  actions  ?  If  we  compare  the 
behavior  of  articulated  animals  with  that 
of  a  polyp  or  amoeba,  we  easily  perceive 
how  far  the  animal  body  has  advanced  in 
its  fitness  to  be  the  habitation  of  intel- 
ligence. 

Though  it  can  hardly  be  doubted  that 
among  the  highest  mollusca  there  is  a  rec- 


248     NATURAL  HISTORY  OF  SYMPATHY. 

ognition  of  the  fellow  life,  it  is  among  the 
articulates  that  we  first  find  clear  evidence 
of  sympathetic  motives.  The  development 
of  this  primal  sympathy  is  undoubtedly 
connected  with  the  separation  of  the  sexes, 
which  in  the  lower  animals,  as  in  many 
plants,  are  generally  united  in  one  individ- 
ual. When  the  sexes  become  distinct, 
some  recognition  of  kindred  life  becomes 
necessary.  We  find  another  stage  in  its 
development  in  the  relation  of  parent  and 
offspring.  The  continuous  care  which  one 
or  both  parents  exercise  over  the  young  is 
a  very  strong  means  of  pushing  onward 
the  growth  of  the  altruistic  motives.  The 
complete  recognition  of  the  external  life, 
which  is  the  basis  of  altruism  in  all  its 
moods,  as  well  as  of  the  higher  power  of 
hedonism,  is  helped  by  the  combat  of  the 
males  with  each  other,  and  by  the  life  of 
flight  and  chase  which  becomes  so  conspic- 
uous a  feature  in  these  highly  developed 
forms. 

Until  we  rise  to  the  level  of  the  insects, 


SYMPATHY  AMONG  ANIMALS.       249 

there  is  no  distinct  mark  of  a  sympathy 
which  goes  beyond  the  love  of  parent  for 
offspring ;  but  among  the  higher  animals 
the  motive  goes  one  step  farther  and  gives 
us  sympathy  with  the  fellow-being  within 
the  limits  of  the  tribe.  This  is  best  seen 
in  the  colonies  of  ants  ahd  bees,  in  which 
there  is  clearly  a  distinct  recognition  of 
the  companion  workers  in  the  hive  or  ant- 
hill. At  no  point,  however,  does  it  go  so 
far  as  to  include  the  species  within  its 
bounds.  The  ant  will  aid  his  clansmen, 
but  his  sympathy  is  limited  by  the  bounds 
of  his  community.  The  member  of  an- 
other tribe  is  his  enemy. 

In  most  cases  the  sympathy  which  pre- 
vails among  associated  insects  appears  to 
be  limited  to  the  work  which  it  is  neces- 
sary for  them  to  do  in  order  to  maintain 
and  extend  the  power  of  their  colonies. 
Nevertheless,  there  are  instances  where  we 
are  forced  to  believe  that  the  mutual  help 
which  they  render  one  another  is  based 
upon  something  more  humanlike  than  a 


250    NATURAL   HISTORY  OF  SYMPATHY. 

blind  automatic  devotion  to  their  social 
labors.  Thus  ants  will  assist  each  other 
with  their  burdens,  working  together  in 
perfect  harmony.  Where  a  member  of 
their  society  is  in  trouble,  as,  for  instance, 
by  having  his  feet  entangled  in  a  sticky 
substance,  his  fellow  -  workers  will  labor 
assiduously,  though  generally  with  little 
skill,  to  free  him  from  his  difficulties.  In 
other  instances,  such  as  among  our  dung 
beetles,  two  or  more  individuals  will  often 
combine  their  forces  in  a  way  to  show  a 
spirit  of  mutual  help  and  some  sense  of 
the  conditions  under  which  it  may  be  best 
rendered.  There  are  those  who  hold  to 
the  view  that  all  these  associated  actions 
of  insects  are  performed  in  an  automatic 
way,  the  creatures  acting  with  no  more 
consciousness  than  exists  in  the  case  of  a 
decapitated  frog,  when,  through  the  reflex 
action  of  its  spinal  column,  it  scratches 
a  portion  of  the  skin  which  the  experi- 
menter irritates.  This  view  concerning 
the  nature  of  the  animal  intelligence  is 


INTELLECTUAL   MOTIVES.  2$  I 

probably  entertained  by  few  persons  who 
have  attentively  studied  the  behavior  of 
bees  and  ants.  A  careful  consideration  of 
their  actions  more  generally  leads  to  the 
supposition  that  their  motives,  though 
without  the  element  of  self-consciousness, 
are  of  a  truly  intellectual  nature. 

While  we  must  marvel  at  the  altruistic 
accord  which  makes  it  possible  for  thou- 
sands of  creatures  to  combine  their  work, 
we  must  not  suppose  that  there  is  a  per- 
fect likeness  between  the  motives  that 
actuate  a  wasp  or  a  bee  and  the  sympathy 
that  we  find  in  the  higher  forms  of  life. 
The  principal  use  of  these  instances  of 
altruistic  relation  in  the  articulates  is  to 
show  us  that  this  class  of  motives  is  no 
peculiar  property  of  the  vertebrate  ani- 
mals, in  which  man  belongs,  but  that  it 
originates  in  other  series  of  animals,  which 
have  no  blood  kinship  with  man. 

Coming  now  to  the  series  of  forms  which 
lead  up  to  man,  the  vertebrates,  or  back- 
boned animals,  we  find  very  complete 


NATURAL   HISTORY  OF  SYMPATHY. 

proof  of  a  separate  development  of  the 
altruistic  motives,  leading  to  results  that, 
while  they  are  akin  to  those  attained  by 
the  articulates,  are  different  from  those 
less  advanced  forms  in  many  important 
ways.  Low  down  in  the  fishes  we  find 
the  sexes  separated ;  and  very  early  in  the 
series,  sexual  affection  apparently  gives 
the  beginning  of  the  sympathetic  motives. 
As  we  advance  in  the  vertebrate  series  to 
the  level  of  the  birds  and  mammals,  we 
find  that  the  young  are  born  in  a  more 
and  more  perfect  condition  and  demand 
a  larger  amount  of  parental  aid  and  care. 
Thus  the  parental  relation,  in  place  of  be- 
ing a  momentary  affair,  as  in  the  lower 
forms,  becomes  an  element  in  the  emo- 
tions of  the  mother  for  the  greater  part  of 
her  life.  The  public  owes  to  John  Fiske 
the  first  statement  of  this  important  truth. 
Among  the  lower  vertebrates,  as  is  the 
case  with  the  lowlier  forms  of  all  the  great 
series  of  animals,  the  care  of  the  offspring 
is  a  task  which  is  almost  entirely  assigned 


PARENTAL  AFFECTION.  253 

to  the  female.  The  duties  connected  with 
the  function  of  reproduction  which  can 
enter  upon  the  plane  of  consciousness  are 
few,  and  usually  occupy  but  a  brief  time  in 
her  life.  The  sympathetic  motives  con- 
nected with  the  task  are  thus  in  their  na- 
ture very  temporary,  their  period  of  awak- 
ening being  limited  to  the  time  in  which 
their  operation  is  necessary.  As  we  ad- 
vance in  the  vertebrate  series,  the  duration 
of  infancy,  the  period  when  the  young  are 
dependent  on  the  mother  for  food  or  pro- 
tection, ever  becomes  greater,  until  in  the 
ordinary  life  of  the  higher  mammalia,  the 
child  of  one  year  is  hardly  weaned  and 
discarded  before  the  succeeding  offspring 
claims  a  place  in  the  parent's  affection. 
Thus  many  of  these  creatures  below  the 
level  of  man  have  the  females  of  the  spe- 
cies placed  under  conditions  which  insure 
an  almost  perennial  activity  of  the  ma- 
ternal sympathies.  Among  the  animal 
progenitors  of  man  there  were  probably 
thousands  of  forms  which  were  subjected 


254    NATURAL  HISTORY  OF  SYMPATHY. 

to  this  primal  education  of  the  altruistic 
sense. 

In  general,  the  male  parent  among  the 
mammals  exhibits  little  interest  in  his  off- 
spring ;  in  fact,  the  sense  of  any  personal 
relation  cannot,  under  the  customs  of 
these  animals,  be  expected  to  exist.  In 
certain  fishes,  and  many  birds  which  have 
the  pairing  habit,  and  where  the  male 
comes  to  recognize  a  relation  to  his  pro- 
geny, his  sympathy  with  the  young  is  very 
clearly  expressed.  It  may,  indeed,  be  as 
intense  as  it  is  in  the  female.  The  rapid 
development  of  the  sympathetic  motive 
among  mankind  may,  in  part,  be  attrib- 
uted to  the  fact  that  they  alone,  among 
the  mammals,  have  developed  the  mono- 
gamic  habit,  and  thus  attained  to  some- 
thing like  the  mother's  relation  to  the  off- 
spring. As  soon  as  this  condition  of  the 
family  was  established  and  the  parental 
affection  of  the  male  thereby  defined  and 
concentrated,  the  conditions  which  make 
for  the  development  of  the  sympathetic 


SYMPATHY  OF  THE   TRIBE.         255 

motive  in  human  kind  were  greatly  en- 
hanced ;  both  parents  being  in  this  re- 
gard quickened,  the  energy  of  the  motive, 
and  the  measure  in  which  it  was  trans- 
mitted from  generation  to  generation,  was 
necessarily  much  increased.' 

After  this  primal  affection  for  offspring, 
the  next  altruistic  step  leads  to  the  sym- 
pathy of  the  tribe,  which  may  possibly 
result  from  the  extension  of  the  parental 
motive  over  a  larger  field,  though  it  seems 
to  me  that  it  arises  from  some  more  gen- 
eral causes.  Until  we  rise  to  man,  the 
advance  in  altruism  seems  to  lead  little 
farther  than  to  the  bounds  of  the  herd, 
which  is  sometimes  only  the  expanded 
family.  Yet  there  are  traces  of  a  sym- 
pathy that  takes  cognizance  of  a  whole 
species  to  which  the  creature  belongs. 
Among  our  pigs,  the  cry  of  distress  of  any 
of  the  species  arouses  a  self-sacrificing 
sympathy  which  is  beautiful  to  behold. 
This  much-abused  animal  gives  us  the 
most  familiar  evidence  of  a  wide-reaching 


2$6    NATURAL  HISTORY  OF  SYMPATHY. 

altruism  that  we  find  in  the  ordinary  do- 
mesticated animals.  Traces  of  this  mo- 
tive are  discernible  in  our  horned  cattle. 
The  smell  of  the  blood  of  their  species 
will  throw  them  into  a  state  of  excitement, 
but  unlike  the  pigs,  who  are  willing  to  do 
battle  for  a  shrieking  comrade,  the  motive 
does  not  impel  them  to  action.  The  best 
evidence  of  distinct  sympathetic  emotion 
of  the  human  sort  may  be  found  in  the 
higher  monkeys.  All  the  evidence  goes 
to  show  that  the  play  of  this  emotion  in 
their  minds  is  singularly  like  our  own.  It 
is  seen  in  the  elephants,  which  are  remark- 
ably altruistic  animals.  Although  sym- 
pathies of  monkeys  seem  to  be  more  like 
those  of  man  than  do  those  of  the  lower 
animals,  it  may  be  that  this  apparent 
greater  likeness  is  due  to  the  fact  that 
the  machinery  of  expression  in  the  an- 
thropoids is  closely  akin  to  that  of  man. 

The  best  evidence  as  to  the  likeness 
which  exists  between  the  sympathetic 
motives  of  our  vertebrate  kindred  and  our 


DOMESTICATION  OF  ANIMALS.      2$? 

own  is  shown  by  the  ease  with  which 
many  of  these  creatures  can  be  made  the 
familiar  and  affectionate  companions  of 
man.  Almost  all  the  birds,  except  those 
of  prey,  and  a  large  part  of  our  mammals, 
including  a  number  of  predaceous  forms, 
can  be,  in  a  complete  sense,  domesticated, 
and  be  made  to  acquire  a  distinct  affection 
for  their  captors.  Although  much  of  this 
affection  can  be  accounted  for  by  the  skill 
and  other  dominant  qualities  of  the  mas- 
ters, the  facts  afford  a  strong  presumption 
for  the  opinion  that  the  fundamental  mo- 
tives of  these  beasts  are  clearly  akin  to 
those  of  our  own  species.  The  only  logi- 
cal explanation  of  the  facts  is  found  in  the 
conclusion  that  the  mind  of  the  animal 
goes  out  to  his  master  from  the  same  sym- 
pathetic reason  which  leads  the  master  to 
love  him.  Moreover,  we  often  note  among 
the  animals  themselves,  at  least  among  the 
domesticated  forms,  a  tendency  of  individ- 
uals of  widely  different  species  to  make 

pets  of  each  other. 
i 


NATURAL  HISTORY  OF  SYMPATHY. 

The  foregoing  brief  glance  at  the  prog- 
ress of  sympathies  in  the  animal  kingdom 
will  justify  the  following  general  state- 
ment :  — 

In  the  beginning  of  the  animal  develop- 
ment, the  mind  germ  is  shut  up  within  the 
body  with  no  effective  means  of  contact 
with  the  outer  world.  Slowly,  on  many 
different  lines  of  development,  through 
infinitely  varied  experiments,  mechanisms 
are  devised  which  give  this  nascent  mind 
instruments  of  relation  with  the  outer 
world.  Sight,  touch,  hearing,  taste,  smell, 
perhaps  other  unperceived  agents  of  sen- 
sibility, gradually  bring  these  creatures  to 
a  sense  of  the  outer  world.  The  world  of 
phenomena  reacts  on  the  mind,  and  in 
various  ways  aids  in  its  development.  All 
through  this  lower  life  the  development  is 
entirely  hedonistic  or  selfish.  The  world 
is  only  for  the  gratification  of  greeds,  and 
the  mind  does  not  appear  to  act  at  all, 
except  under  the  stimulus  of  appetite.  It 
sleeps  between  the  demands  of  the  several 


THE  LOWER  RACES  OF  MEN.       259 

forms  of  hunger.  There  is  some  recogni- 
tion of  the  outer  world  and  a  capacity  to 
act  on  this  recognition  at  last.  Sexual  and 
parental  love  lay  the  foundations  of  true 
sympathy. 

This  sense  of  sympathy  appears  to 
widen  apace  as  we  rise  in  the  scale  of  or- 
ganization, but  in  its  wider  aspect  it  is 
substantially  limited  to  those  animals 
which  go  in  herds  or  droves.  It  is  not 
seen  in  the  solitary  animals,  who,  however 
devoted  they  may  be  to  their  young,  ex- 
hibit no  trace  of  affection  for  others  of 
their  species.  When  we  come  to  consider 
the  position  of  the  sympathies  in  the  lower 
races  of  men,  we  find  that  they  afford  us 
a  singularly  close  likeness  to  the  condi- 
tions that  we  find  in  the  brute  kindred 
of  man.  The  maternal  sympathy  is  the 
strongest  of  all  the  forms  of  the  emotion. 
The  tribal  sympathy  is  hardly  more  ardent 
than  among  the  monkeys,  and  there  is 
scarcely  a  trace  of  the  extended  affection 
for  the  species  which  belongs  in  the  higher 


26O    NATURAL  HISTORY  OF  SYMPATHY. 

man.  Of  the  outgoing  of  the  mind  in 
sympathy  to  nature  or  to  a  Creator,  there 
is  scarcely  a  trace.  The  recognition  of  a 
Divinity,  if  it  exists  at  all,  rests  upon  the 
impulse  of  fear,  but  not  of  love. 

But  from  this  animal  form  of  the  sym- 
pathies in  the  lower  man  there  goes  on, 
in  certain  races,  a  most  rapid  development 
of  the  whole  range  of  altruistic  motives. 
To  the  love  of  the  mother  for  the  young 
the  love  of  the  father  is  added,  for  among 
the  lowest  savages  there  is  little  trace  of 
paternal  care.  Sympathy  with  the  tribe 
is  rapidly  extended  to  sympathy  with  the 
race.  The  motive  of  love  toward  the  gods 
grows  in  intensity  as  well  as  purity,  and 
is  finally  gathered  into  the  intense,  life-ab- 
sorbing devotion  of  the  higher  monothe- 
ism. In  very  modern  days  we  have  these 
motives  yet  more  extended.  The  keen 
sympathy  which  included  only  the  tribe 
has  been  extended,  until  at  length  it  in- 
folds all  the  life  of  the  lower  animals  in 
its  loving  embrace.  Yet  more  strangely, 


SCOPE   OF  SYMPATHETIC  MOTIVES.   26 1 

there  has  been  added  to  this  set  of  affec- 
tions a  love  of  nature,  an  affection  for  the 
whole  range  of  phenomena,  which,  though 
in  its  beginning,  and  as  yet  weak,  prom- 
ises to  become,  through  inheritance  and 
habit,  one  of  the  most  important  elements 
in  the  structure  of  the  mind. 

It  is  not  easy  too  strongly  to  affirm  the 
measure  of  the  difference  in  the  range  of 
volume  of  the  sympathetic  motive  be- 
tween the  most  cultivated  men  of  to-day 
and  those  of  two  thousand  years  ago.  It 
seems  to  me  that  the  essential,  indeed  we 
may  say  the  vital  difference  between  the 
Greeks  in  their  prime  and  the  more  cul- 
tivated people  of  to-day  consists  in  the 
scope  of  the  sympathetic  motives.  In  all 
that  relates  to  merely  human  sympathy 
within  the  bounds  of  the  family  or  of  ac- 
quaintance, the  difference  between  Athe- 
nian culture  and  that  of  the  present  day 
may  perhaps  be  reckoned  as  not  very 
great.  Nevertheless,  the  affection  in  the 
domestic  circle  appears  to  have  been  less 


262    NATURAL  HISTORY  OF  SYMPATHY. 

strong  than  with  our  time  and  people,  and 
the  friendships  between  men  less  pure 
and  trustworthy  than  in  our  own  society. 
A  remarkable  feature  of  the  Grecian  mind 
consisted  in  the  fact  that  the  sympathies 
never  went  forth  to  the  folk  who  were 
beyond  the  limits  of  their  own  race  and 
language.  To  them  the  barbarian  was  ab- 
solutely uninteresting  except,  it  might  be, 
from  mere  curiosity.  If  the  penetrating 
mind  of  Aristotle  could  consider  the  con- 
ditions of  our  modern  life,  nothing  would 
surprise  him  so  much  as  the  interest  of 
our  people  in  far-away  folk  with  whom  we 
hold  relation  only  through  sympathy.  In 
every  other  feature  of  our  society  he  would 
see  the  amplification  of  motives  which 
existed  in  his  own  time.  From  the  point 
of  view  of  altruism,  he  would  be  forced  to 
the  conviction  that  the  modern  man  was, 
in  a  way,  a  new  moral  species.  He  would, 
for  instance,  be  entirely  puzzled  by  our 
missionary  societies  and  those  for  the  pre- 
vention of  cruelty  to  animals. 


VARIOUS  MODES  OF  ALTRUISM.    263 

It  seems  to  me  that  all  these  various 
modes  of  altruism  have  much  in  common. 
They  all  rest  upon  the  singular  power  the 
mind  has  to  put  itself  beyond  the  sphere 
of  its  personal  desires  and  appetites  ;  on 
its  having  power  to  go  in  imagination  into 
the  place  of  the  life  it  has  in  view.  Mani- 
festly the  strongest  of  these  modes  or  emo- 
tions of  altruism  is  that  which  is  the  deep- 
est stamped  into  the  mind  by  long  use, 
namely,  sympathy  with  progeny.  Next  in 
intensity  and  constancy  is  the  form  we 
term  friendship,  which  passes  by  insensi- 
ble gradations  into  the  larger  affection  for 
the  race,  or  for  life  in  general.  The  form 
of  the  emotion  which  we  term  the  love  of 
God,  which  manifests  itself  in  a  devotion 
to  a  divinity,  is  perhaps  the  most  intense 
form  of  the  altruistic  sentiment,  but  it  is 
far  more  variable  in  different  individuals 
than  either  of  the  preceding.  The  faint- 
est and  newest  of  these  modes  of  altruism 
is  the  love  of  nature,  which  has  several 
obscure  modes  or  subordinate  divisions, 
such  as  the  love  of  the  beautiful. 


264    NA  TURAL  HIS  TOR  Y  OF  S  YMPA  THY. 

It  is  now  for  us  to  consider  a  very  im- 
portant question  concerning  this  series  of 
development,  which  we  can  evidently  trace 
in  the  altruistic  motives.  Has  the  forma- 
tion of  these  motives  been  due,  in  any  con- 
siderable degree,  to  the  action  of  selective 
forces  ?  Can  we  hope  to  explain  the  evolu- 
tion of  this  class  of  impulses  by  the  sup- 
position that  each  stage  in  the  advance  of 
altruism  was  so  far  profitable  that  the  crea- 
tures which  made  the  advance  survived, 
while  those  which  did  not  failed  to  sur- 
vive ? 

Although  I  believe  that  the  theory  of 
selection  enables  us  to  account  for  many 
of  the  structural  peculiarities  of  animals,  I 
confess  it  does  not  seem  to  me  possible  to 
extend  the  results  of  our  observations  to 
these  mental  peculiarities  of  animals.  All 
we  know  of  mind  seems  to  indicate  that  it 
does  not  follow  in  its  changes  the  same 
train  of  conditions  as  the  body  it  occupies. 
We  see  this  conspicuously  in  ourselves. 

Man,  in  his  physical  frame,  is,  consider- 


THE  HYPOTHESIS  OF  SELECTION.    26$ 

ing  the  length  of  his  sojourn  on  earth,  the 
variety  of  conditions  he  occupies,  and  the 
diversity  of  employment  he  pursues,  a  sin- 
gularly invariable  animal  as  regards  his 
bodily  frame,  while  his  mental  parts,  and 
especially  the  altruistic  elements  thereof, 
have  a  very  wide  range  of  variations.  If 
we  consider  the  parental  sympathy  alone, 
we  may  fairly  argue  that  the  offspring  have 
a  better  chance  of  surviving  when  the 
mother  is  moved  to  the  care  of  them,  so 
the  strain  of  blood  in  which  care-giving 
is  best  implanted  will  be  most  likely  to 
bring  the  young  to  the  adult  condition. 
But  beyond  this  point  it  is  difficult  to  see 
how  selective  or  hereditary  action  can 
have  anything  to  do  with  the  advance  in 
the  altruistic  motive.  When  it  comes  to 
sympathy  within  the  limits  of  the  tribe, 
it  is  not  possible  to  construct  a  tenable 
hypothesis  to  explain  it,  by  means  of  selec- 
tion. Although  the  fact  that  any  individ- 
ual is  willing  to  sacrifice  his  life  for  the 
community  is  doubtless  advantageous  to 


266    NATURAL  HISTORY  OF  SYMPATHY. 

the  association,  it  is  clearly  not  profitable 
to  the  individual,  at  least  not  in  a  material 
way. 

It  will  not  do  to  say  that  those  tribes 
which  have  the  most  self-sacrificing  indi- 
viduals are  the  most  likely  to  survive  in 
their  contentions  with  other  tribes,  and 
that  in  this  way  the  selection  is  brought 
about.  It  would  be  almost  as  reasonable 
to  assert  that  the  French  nation  was  ele- 
vated in  size  and  vigor  by  the  Napoleonic 
wars,  which  took  nearly  all  the  well-grown 
and  sturdy  men  to  death  on  foreign  battle- 
fields. Such  reasoning  reduces  the  valua- 
ble hypothesis  of  selection  to  the  level  of 
the  doctrine  of  cycles  and  epicycles,  which 
the  old  astronomy  applied  to  the  solar  sys- 
tem. With  another  epicycle  it  was  easy 
for  the  Ptolemaic  astronomy  to  explain 
each  peculiarity  of  the  stars'  motions  as  it 
was  discovered,  and  so  to  keep  the  scheme 
in  accord  with  the  supposition  that  the 
earth  stood  still  and  the  heavenly  bodies 
moved  around  it.  So,  too,  the  believers  in 


SELECTION  DOES  NOT  EXPLAIN.    267 

the  unlimited  action  of  selection  may,  by 
adding  another  epicycle  of  wider  range  to 
their  hypothesis,  secure  an  available  expla- 
nation of  every  fact  in  nature  ;  but  this 
method  will  not  commend  itself  to  natural- 
ists who  have  not  made  a  cult  of  this  law. 

Even  if  we  should  accept  the  second 
stage  of  development  of  altruism,  as  deter- 
mined by  selection,  it  would  not  aid  us 
much.  It  would  only  help  us  to  go  a  little 
farther  in  the  guidance  of  this  hypothesis, 
for  when  we  come  to  the  point  where  the 
altruistic  emotions  of  man  expand,  so  as  to 
include  all  life  and  the  power  that  lies  be- 
yond the  realm  of  visible  things,  even  the 
wildest  advocate  of  selection  would  not 
claim  that  it  could  aid  us  to  understand 
how  this  extension  came  about. 

It  seems  to  me  that  the  facts  compel  us 
to  believe  that,  though  selection  may  ac- 
count for  the  accumulation  and  increase  of 
the  earliest  and  simplest  modes  of  altru- 
ism, it  helps  us  but  little  to  understand 
the  conditions  that  have  originated  it  or 


268    NATURAL  HISTORY  OF  SYMPATHY. 

have  given  it  the  great  place  in  man's  life 
that  it  now  has.  It  seems  to  me  most  rea- 
sonable to  suppose  that  the  altruistic  mo- 
tive, the  impulse  to  get  beyond  the  bounds 
of  self,  owes  its  development,  if  not  its 
origin,  to  determinative  influences  that 
we  cannot  recognize  in  any  known  natural 
laws,  unless  we  assume  a  law  of  moral 
advance. 

It  is  self-evident  that  the  altruistic  mo- 
tives are  the  foundation  of  religion  and 
morality.  However  formalized,  however 
concealed  by  the  superstructure  they  de- 
rive from  the  accidents  of  the  mind,  these 
elements  of  our  human  life  have  all 
their  supports  in  the  sympathetic  motive. 
Therefore  the  way  in  which  these  motives 
have  developed  in  the  past  and  are  to 
change  in  the  future  are  matters  of  the 
very  highest  interest  to  all  who  care  for 
the  moral  advance  of  man. 

As  to  the  future  of  the  altruistic  im- 
pulse, the  naturalist  has  little  right  to 
speak.  The  motives  of  this  division  of  the 


THE  FUTURE  OF  ALTRUISM.       269 

mind  are  less  distinctly  connected  with 
any  developmental  process  than  any  other 
instincts,  and  they  have  long  since  escaped 
from  the  dominion  of  the  laws  which  he 
studies.  It  is  evident  that  the  matter  is 
now  a  subject  for  the  psychologist  alone. 
I  venture,  however,  to  follow  the  line  of 
these  considerations  a  little  way  beyond 
the  limits  of  biological  science.  It  is  al- 
ready clear  to  us  that  the  altruistic  mo*- 
tives  lead  creatures  in  which  they  origi- 
nate, far  beyond  the  narrow  path  trodden 
by  our  brute  ancestors  in  their  narrow 
round  of  greeds  and  satisfactions.  All  the 
mental  and  moral  growth  which  could  be 
had  in  the  earlier  life  was  gained  through 
these  altruistic  impulses.  From  the  lower 
life  this  seed  of  better  things  came  to 
man.  It  has  been  the  task  of  all  religion 
to  foster  the  development  of  the  sympa- 
thetic motive,  and  to  set  its  care  above 
all  other  human  interests.  In  this  task 
it  is  doing  the  most  natural  work  in  the 
world,  the  work  that  is  the  most  perfect 


2/0    NATURAL  HISTORY  OF  SYMPATHY. 

furtherance  of  the  best  in  the  earlier  law. 
Hitherto  it  has  been  the  peculiar  work  of 
religion  to  enforce  the  action  and  to  direct 
the  altruistic  motives  in  two  lines  :  namely, 
sympathy  with  the  fellow-being  and  the 
love  for  the  Supreme.  There  can  be  no 
doubt  in  the  reasonable  mind  that  the 
work  has  been,  on  the  whole,  well  done. 
There  has  doubtless  been  a  great  advance 
6*f  the  altruistic  motives  from  the  worship 
of  anthropomorphic  gods  in  former  time  to 
the  worship  of  a  Supreme  Being.  It  seems 
to  me  that  this  energetic  form  of  altruism 
which  religion  has  bred  in  men  has  flowed 
back  upon  the  lower  forms  of  the  emo- 
tion, and  that  man  is  more  sympathetic 
towards  his  fellows  and  towards  the  natural 
world  than  he  ever  could  have  been  but 
for  the  worship  of  the  Creator.  In  every 
field  of  human  thought  we  find  the  influ- 
ence of  this  vast  awakening,  which  could 
only  have  come  from  the  exercise  of  the 
altruistic  impulse  in  its  highest  and  most 
stimulating  form.  Only  through  religion 


THE  SENSE   OF  SIN.  2?  I 

could  man  advance  swiftly  and  surely  to 
the  sense  of  ordered  control  in  nature, 
which  is  the  breath  of  all  science. 

There  is  yet  another  and  more  impor- 
tant effect  in  part  accomplished,  in  larger 
part  yet  to  be  secured,  by  the  further  ad- 
vance of  the  altruistic  motive.  When,  in 
the  process  of  mental  development,  self- 
consciousness  arises,  a  trial  that  probably 
did  not  come  upon  life  until  it  attained  to 
man's  estate,  the  creature  finds  itself  in  a 
miserable  plight.  Then  for  the  first  time 
the  soul  feels  itself  naked  and  alone  in  the 
world.  The  old  impulses,  inherited  from 
the  animal  ancestry,  join  issue  with  the 
emotions  which  the  sympathies  arouse. 
Then,  it  seems  to  me,  awakens  the  sense 
of  sin.  The  natural  man  is  at  war  with 
the  spiritual  man,  and  the  creature's  self- 
hood grows  sore  from  the  conflict.  No 
one  of  us  but  what  has  felt  the  almost 
mortal  sickness  which  sometimes  comes 
from  the  many  varying  moods  of  self-con- 
sciousness. Men  seek  some  lightening  of 


272    NATURAL  HISTORY  OF  SYMPATHY. 

the  burden  wherever  they  can  find  it. 
They  give  themselves  back  to  the  uncon- 
sciousness that  blessed  their  animal  ances- 
tors, by  means  of  alcohol  or  opium.  They 
forget  themselves  on  the  battlefield  or  at 
the  gaming-table,  or,  in  a  better  way,  they 
seek  escape  in  human  fellowship,  in  some 
battle  with  nature,  or  in  the  exercises  of 
religion,  downward  or  upward,  any  way 
out  of  this  torment  of  self. 

From  this  trouble  of  self-consciousness, 
which  probably  owes  its  origin,  in  part  at 
least,  to  the  exercise  of  altruistic  motives, 
altruism  itself  opens  a  blessed  way.  Few 
mortals  are  so  unhappily  shaped  that  their 
souls  may  not  become  possessed  with  this 
outgoing  power  of  sympathy,  and  thus 
attain  this  way  of  escape  from  self-con- 
sciousness. Religions  have  offered  various 
paths  of  escape.  Buddhism  proposes  that 
the  mind  shall  free  itself  from  self-con- 
sciousness by  what  to  men  of  our  time  is 
an  incomprehensible  process  of  crushing 
the  self  within  itself.  The  creed  of  Islam 


THE   CHRISTIAN  DOCTRINE.        2/3 

seeks  it  by  an  excitation  of  a  religious 
fury.  It  seems  to  me  that  the  Christian 
doctrine,  looked  at  purely  from  the  point 
of  view  of  natural  science,  has  the  merit 
of  setting  the  altruistic  motives  on  a  wider 
foundation  than  any  other  form  of  reli- 
gion. "Thou  shalt  love  the  Lord  thy 
God  with  all  thy  soul  and  all  thy  might, 
and  thy  neighbor  as  thyself."  Verily,  this 
is  the  greatest  of  all  commandments  ;  on 
it,  indeed,  hang  all  the  law  and  the  pro- 
phets. It  has  carried  man  farther  out  of 
the  prison  of  self  than  all  the  other  teach- 
ings that  have  come  to  him.  Far  as  this 
advance  in  altruistic  habits  has  gone,  there 
is  no  sign  that  it  is  near  its  end.  Men 
live  more  out  of  themselves,  through  their 
sympathies,  than  ever  before. 

The  love  of  nature  has  been  added  to 
the  other  loves,  and  in  the  well-developed 
man  of  to-day,  every  moment  affords 
something  to  call  the  mind  out  into  the 
universe.  It  gives  promise  of  going  yet 
farther.  Under  its  beneficent  forgetful- 


2/4     NATURAL  HISTORY  OF  SYMPATHY. 

ness,  that  ugliest  incident  of  our  personal- 
ity, death,  is  losing  something  of  the  old 
darkness  of  its  shadows.  Men  no  longer 
spend  so  much  of  their  life  like  prisoners 
under  sentence,  with  the  sound  of  the 
building  scaffold  ringing  in  their  ears. 
Altruistic  persons  are  too  little  in  the 
narrow  space  of  their  selfhood  to  consider 
death.  It  seems  to  me  that  we  may  look 
for  the  time  when  men  will  live  out  their 
lives  in  sympathetic  activities  so  far  above 
the  plane  of  self,  that  not  only  labor,  but 
this  end  of  all  earthly  labor,  will  be  almost 
unfelt.  If  this  comes,  life  will  have  com- 
pleted its  cycle  from  the  dull  unconscious- 
ness of  the  lower  brutes  to  the  self-con- 
sciousness of  man's  early  state,  and  thence 
by  the  escape  from  selfhood  through  sym- 
pathy, to  that  real  absorption  into  the 
Infinite,  that  true  nirvana,  which  nature 
offers  by  the  way  of  the  sympathies. 

To  the  naturalist  who  looks  upon  the 
present  estate  of  man  as  the  result  of  the 
physical  and  organic  influences  to  which 


THE  PLACE   OF  CHRISTIANITY.      2?$ 

he  has  been  subjected  during  all  his  course 
from  the  lowest  life  to  the  present  time, 
religions  appear  to  be  the  products  of 
human  history,  and  are  to  be  estimated  in 
the  same  way  as  other  facts.  Considering 
the  religions  of  mankind  as  phenomena, 
and  valuing  them  according  to  their  rela- 
tion with  the  series  of  organic  develop- 
ments, and  leaving  aside  in  the  estimate 
all  the  prejudices  of  education,  it  seems  to 
the  student  clear  that  Christianity  occu- 
pies a  peculiar  place  in  these  modes  of 
thought.  More  than  any  other  it  is,  in  the 
essentials  of  its  form,  in  the  direct  trend 
of  psychic  development.  In  my  own  mind, 
the  doctrine  of  Christ  is  the  summit  and 
crown  of  the  organic  series.  It  expresses 
the  final  result  of  that  directed  striving 
which  began  hundreds  of  millions  of  years 
ago,  and  through  infinite  toil  and  pains 
has  led  to  this  supreme  accomplishment. 
It  offers  the  natural  line  of  escape  from 
the  evils  of  hedonism,  and  the  curse  which 
self-consciousness  brought  upon  mankind. 


276    NATURAL  HISTORY  OF  SYMPATHY. 

If  this  view  of  the  relation  of  altruism 
to  human  development  be  true,  then  it  is 
evident  that  we,  who  are  in  our  various 
ways  striving  to  better  the  condition  of 
our  fellows,  may  learn  from  it  much  that 
will  give  direction  to  our  work  as  teachers. 
In  the  first  place,  it  shows  us  that  the  key 
to  education  is  in  developing  the  altruistic 
powers.  We  must  train  the  mind  to  go 
out  of  itself,  and  stay  out  of  the  self  as 
far  as  possible.  This  habit  of  projecting 
the  mind  beyond  the  inner  realm  can  only 
be  attained  by  taking  the  strongly  inher- 
ited forms  of  sympathy,  those  that  are 
most  easily  awakened,  and  through  their 
exercise,  developing  the  general  capacity 
for  outgoing.  The  sympathy  with  the 
fellow-being  and  the  power  to  adore  the 
Infinite  thus  become  the  first  objects  of 
our  education.  With  these  sympathies 
aroused,  we  may  hope  to  have  a  mind  well 
fitted  for  all  the  forms  of  altruistic  action. 
Therefore  I  think  that  education  should 
begin  with  what  we  may,  with  a  new  and 


THE  KEY  TO  EDUCATION;         2/7 

better  meaning,  call  the  humanities ;  those 
lines  of  culture  that  lead  the  mind  out  on 
the  easy  way  to  sympathy  and  affection 
for  one's  fellow-men.  From  these  inher- 
ited and  therefore  natural  forms  of  altru- 
ism we  may  hope  to  win  a  place  for  that 
love  of  nature  on  which  the  man  of 
science  builds.  I  feel  compelled  to  resent 
the  efforts  of  those  educators  who  would 
undertake  the  training  for  the  work  of  life 
with  the  study  of  physical  science  alone. 
There  may  be  minds  that  can  be  immedi- 
ately awakened  to  life  by  physical  science, 
for  in  the  infinite  variety  of  man  almost 
any  peculiarity  can  be  found  ;  but  no  ob- 
servant teacher  can  feel  it  safe  to.  begin 
the  intellectual  life  of  the  child  with 
things  so  remote  from  the  old  channels  of 
the  human  mind.  Man  has  had  the  world 
opened  to  him  by  the  gateway  of  his  sym- 
pathies, and  by  that  portal  he  should  al- 
ways be  led  on  his  way  into  life. 


CHAPTER  VII. 

THE  IMMORTALITY  OF    THE   SOUL  FROM  THE 
POINT   OF   VIEW   OF    NATURAL    SCIENCE. 

AN  excessive,  and,  in  a  way,  unreason- 
able respect  for  the  opinions  of  scientific 
men  in  the  matter  of  the  immortality  of 
the  soul  is  characteristic  of  our  modern 
thought.  It  indicates  the  growing  con- 
viction as  to  the  essential  unity  of  all 
things ;  it  shows  that  the  mass  of  men  are 
insensibly  drifting  to  the  great  conclu- 
sion with  which  naturalists  and  supernat- 
uralists  have  alike  to  reckon,  the  abso- 
lute unity  in  the  government  of  nature. 
There  is  perhaps  no  other  feature  of  pub- 
lic opinion  which  so  clearly  shows  how 
deeply  the  general  principles  of  modern 
science  have  penetrated  into  the  body  of 
public  opinion,  as  this  insistent  desire 


THE    VIEWS  OF  NATURALISTS.      279 

to  test  ancient  faiths  by  the  new  know- 
ledge. 

The  attitude  of  scientific  men  towards 
the  doctrine  of  the  personal  immortality 
of  the  soul  appears  to  be  a  matter  of 
much  interest  to  the  public.  Every 
teacher  in  this  field  of  inquiry  finds  him- 
self subject  to  frequent  interrogations  as 
to  the  measure  of  his  belief  in  a  future 
life,  and  he  readily  discovers  that  his  an- 
swers have  an  undue  weight  with  those 
who  hear  them.  There  is  hardly  suffi- 
cient reason  for  this  desire  to  ascertain 
the  views  of  naturalists  concerning  a 
problem  which  clearly  lies  beyond  their 
province.  The  rules  of  their  calling  limit 
them  to  considerations  which  have  a  place 
in  the  phenomenal  world  alone.  If  they 
go  far  from  the  facts  with  which  they  have 
to  deal,  they  transgress  the  limits  of  their 
clearly  defined  field,  and  enter  wildernesses 
which  they  have  no  right  to  tread.  If 
they  essay  journeys  there,  they  must  make 
them  without  the  semblance  of  authority. 


280       IMMORTALITY  OF  THE  SOUL. 

Although  the  students  of  nature  are  by 
the  rules  of  their  craft  limited  to  the  phe- 
nomenal world,  they  have  been  wont  to 
express  their  convictions  as  to  the  possi- 
bilities of  existence  in  forms  independent 
of  the  body,  and  have  often  given  their 
verdict  as  to  the  immortality  of  the  soul  in 
a  very  authoritative  manner.     In  general 
their  verdict  has  been  adverse  to  the  doc- 
trine of   immortality.     I  propose  to   con- 
sider the  nature  of  the  foundations  of  this 
judgment,  and  in  general  to  take  account 
of  the  facts  which  appear  to  make  for  or 
against  the  view  that  the  essential  quali- 
ties of  men  survive  the  process  of  death. 
The  reader  should  not  expect  much  profit 
from  these  considerations  ;  yet  while  the 
results  will  have  a  negative  rather  than  a 
positive  value,  they  may  serve  in  a  way  to 
clear  the  ground  of  certain  incumbrances, 
and   to   show   in   a  definite    manner  the 
proper   attitude   of    those   who    cultivate 
physical   science  towards  the  large  ques- 
tion of  the  hereafter. 


BONDAGE   OF  ANCIENT  BELIEFS.    28 1> 

When  the  method  of  interpreting  na- 
ture  by  means    of    observations    parted 
from  the  more  ancient  system  in  which 
the   phenomena    of    the   world  were   ac- 
counted for  by  the  direct  interference  of 
a  supernatural  power,  the  votaries  of  the 
new  science  naturally  became  at  once,  and 
to  a  very  great  extent,  emancipated  from 
the   bondage   of    ancient   beliefs.      They 
seemed    to   themselves   to   enter  upon  a 
terrestrial   paradise   which   appeared  well 
walled  off  from  the  mystical  realm  ;  they 
were   in   a   measure   excommunicated  by 
the  older  faith,  and  they  rejoiced  in  their 
new-found  freedom.     Many  a  man  of  to- 
day personally  experiences   the  influence 
of  this  transition  which  he  may  trace  in 
the  whole  history  of  natural  science.     If 
from  the  intangible  realm  of  faith  or  phi- 
losophy, where  he  sees  but  dimly  or  not 
at  all,  he  comes  to  the  study  of  clear-cut 
natural  facts,  he  is  apt  to  be  enchanted 
with  the  clear  seeing  which  he  at  once 
enjoys.     For  a  time  he  seems  to  be  in  a 


282       IMMORTALITY  OF  THE  SOUL. 

realm  of  light ;  he  fancies  that  his  new 
province  is  so  replete  with  certainties  that 
he  will  never  have  again  to  deal  with 
shadowy  things.  Antecedent  and  conse- 
quent are  so  distinctly  enchained  that 
there  seems  no  place  for  doubt ;  but  as 
the  student  goes  on  in  his  work  he  finds 
that  his  ways  lead  from  beneath  the  verti- 
cal sun  which  illuminates  simple  truths  to 
regions  where  the  rays  become  more  and 
more  aslant,  and  in  the  end  the  light  fails 
him  altogether.  He  is  then  in  the  place 
of  our  science  of  to-day,  where  the  men  of 
science  become  conscious  of  the  fact  that 
they,  too,  have  to  explore  the  darkness  if 
they  would  seek  the  answer  of  all  their 
larger  questions. 

The  sturdy,  self-satisfied  denials  of  im- 
mortality; the  confident  statements  of 
men  who  said  there  was  no  soul  because 
they  could  not  find  it  with  the  knife  or 
weigh  it  in  the  balance,  were  put  forth  in 
the  days  when  naturalists  had  but  begun 
their  inquiries  in  the  phenomenal  world 


EXPLORING   THE  DARKNESS.       283 

Year  by  year  they  have  learned  a  fitter 
distrust  as  to  their  right  to  pass  a  final 
judgment  in  this  matter.  Steadfastly  they 
have  come  to  perceive  more  clearly  the 
truth  that  they  really  abide  in  a  universe, 
and  that  the  part  which  is  revealed  to 
them  is  to  the  sum  of  the  facts  only  as  one 
to  infinity.  Gradually  it  has  been  forced 
upon  them  that  they  too  have  to  assume 
the  intangible  if  they  would  take  any  firm 
steps  in  explaining  the  series  of  facts  with 
which  they  have  to  deal.  A  large  part  of 
this  caution  is  due  to  our  study  of  organic 
phenomena,  especially  in  that  part  of  the 
biologic  field  where  the  investigator  has 
to  consider  the  marvelous  truths  of  inher- 
itance. In  face  of  these  facts  of  descent, 
the  most  pragmatic  naturalist  is  sure  to 
learn  some  caution  in  his  criticism  of  phi- 
losophers and  theologians. 

In  general  it  may  be  said  that  the  most 
insistent  expressions  of  disbelief  as  to  the 
endurance  of  the  individual  after  the  body 
has  been  resolved  into  its  elements  have 


284      IMMORTALITY  OF  THE  SOUL. 

come  from  the  students  of  biology,  mainly 
from  those  who  have  been  concerned  in 
the  anatomical  study  of  the  human  body. 
In  these  men  the  habit  of  the  common- 
place, which  so  tends  to  degrade  all  our 
conceptions  of  nature,  has  led  to  the  belief 
that  the  unseen  was  non-existent.  It  is 
difficult  for  the  most  fair-minded  student 
of  organic  forms  to  perceive  the  magni- 
tude of  the  unknown  in  all  that  pertains 
to  psychic  phenomena,  so  long  as  his  in- 
quiries are  limited  to  an  individual  crea- 
ture. The  most  important  effect  from 
that  new  aspect  of  our  science  which  we 
term  Darwinian  is  found  in  the  fact  that 
it  has  forced  students  to  look  upon  each 
separate  organism  as  a  mere  phase  in  the 
propagation  of  a  great  impulse,  which  has 
been  transmitted  through  an  inconceivably 
long  series  from  the  remote  past.  Here, 
indeed,  we  find  the  spiritual  element  in  our 
modern  biologic  science,  which  has  already 
greatly  affected,  though  it  has  but  begun 
to  influence,  the  minds  of  naturalists. 


MATERIALISTIC  OPINIONS.         285 

Not  only  has  this  sense  of  the  profound 
depth  of  the  unknown  sobered  the  minds 
of  students  who  concern  themselves  with 
the  organic  world,  but  a  change  in  the 
views  concerning  the  constitution  of  mat- 
ter has  also  done  much  to  bring  them  to  a 
new  attitude  as  to  the  substantial  foun- 
dations of  the  phenomena  with  which 
they  have  to  deal.  A  generation  ago  we 
conceived  that  matter  was  an  inert  some- 
thing which  was  quickened  into  activity 
by  energy,  and  that  this  energy  was  in  its 
nature  essentially  different  from  the  phy- 
sical basis  of  the  universe.  The  confidence 
of  those  who  held  to  the  opinions  com- 
monly termed  materialistic  was  largely 
due  to  this  belief  in  the  dual  organization 
of  nature.  Observing  the  ever-changing 
character  of  the  natural  forces  and  the 
endless  transmutations  which  they  un- 
dergo in  action,  and  noting  at  the  same 
time  what  seemed  to  them  the  inert  char- 
acter of  substance  except  when  stirred 
into  motion  or  built  into  form,  they  natu- 


286       IMMORTALITY  OF  THE  SOUL. 

rally  were  led  to  deny  the  immortality  of 
the  soul,  and  to  base  their  negations,  as 
they  supposed,  on  a  firm  material  founda- 
tion. Of  late  years,  however,  the  opinion 
has  been  gaining  among  physicists  that 
matter  itself  is  but  a  mode  of  action  of 
energy,  and  so  in  place  of  the  dualistic 
basis,  naturalists  are  being  driven  to  a  con- 
ception of  unity  as  regards  the  phenome- 
nal world. 

It  is  not  difficult  to  see  that  in  propor- 
tion as  we  come  to  the  opinion  that  nature 
is  but  an  exhibition  of  energy  in  various 
forms  of  presentation  we  are  driven  to  a 
new  conception  as  to  the  essential  condi- 
tions of  existence.  It  is  obvious  that  we 
are  less  entitled  than  of  old  to  make  state- 
ments based  upon  the  evanescent  charac- 
ter of  energy,  or  to  suppose  that  we  have 
compassed  the  range  of  its  modes  of  ac- 
tion. The  correction  brings  with  it  no 
affirmation,  but  it  diminishes  our  trust  in 
the  ancient  disbeliefs. 

It  is  to  modern  studies  in  biology  that 


VASTNESS  OF  THE  PROBLEM.   287 

we  owe  the  greatest  pause  in  the  tide  of 
conceit  or  confidence  that  so  long  bore  our 
naturalists  comfortably  onward.  The  old 
doctrine  of  archetypes  or  supposed  un- 
seen moulds  which  shaped  organic  forms 
conduced  to  theoretically  definite  views 
concerning  the  nature  of  life.  Discern- 
ing naturalists  for  some  centuries  have 
had  a  vague  sense  as  to  the  meaning  of 
inheritance.  They  saw  that  within  the 
limits  of  human  kind,  for  instance,  such 
features  as  race  characteristics  indicate 
the  long-continued  accumulation  of  pecu- 
liarities. It  was  not,  however,  until  the 
students  of  plants  and  animals  abandoned 
the  theory  of  special  separate  creations 
and  came  to  look  upon  the  existing  spe- 
cies as  the  lineal  and  normal  descendants 
of  ancestral  forms  which  lead  step  by  step 
backward  to  the  dawn  of  life,  that  it  was 
possible  for  them  even  to  begin  to  see  the 
vast  nature  of  the  problems  with  which 
they  had  to  deal.  As  yet,  we  have  made 
but  a  beginning  in  the  work  of  exploring 


IMMORTALITY  OF  THE  SOUL. 

this  great  shadowy  realm,  but  even  at  the 
outset  of  the  labors  we  perceive  how  great 
are  the  changes  of  view  concerning  the 
character  of  organic  beings  which  we  are 
there  to  obtain. 

The  main  point  in  the  theory  of  descent 
which  deserves  our  attention  concerns  the 
accumulation  and  transmission  of  experi- 
ence. It  is  evident  that  all  the  familiar 
creatures  which  now  inhabit  the  planet 
derive  the  influences  which  form  their 
bodies  from  the  preceding  geologic  ages. 
They  are  not  to  be  regarded  as  congeries 
of  material  so  arranged  that  they  operate 
in  the  manner  of  clocks,  but  each  is  in 
effect  directed  by  influences  which  have 
been  accumulated,  it  may  be  through  mil- 
lions of  generations.  The  first  hypothesis 
-of  inheritance  is  that  of  Charles  Darwin, 
commonly  known  as  pangenesis.  Accord- 
ing to  this  theory,  each  portion  of  the 
organic  body  is  continually  giving  forth 
swarms  of  hypothetical  gemmules  or  mi- 
nute structural  units,  which  have  in  them- 


PANGENESIS.  28$ 

selves  the  capacity  of  reproducing  or  guid- 
ing the  reproduction  of  parts  essentially 
like  those  whence  they  came.  In  the 
process  of  birth  of  a  new  individual  a 
sufficient  quantity  of  these  gemmules  is 
handed  on  through  the  passage  of  the  egg 
to-  control  the  shape  of  the  new  being. 
Thus  we  have  to  suppose  that  every  cell 
of  an  animal  or  plant  is  constantly  putting 
forth  swarms  of  these  gemmules,  which, 
when  they  are  transferred  by  the  process 
of  generation,  in  some  unknown  way  find 
their  path  to  the  particular  part  of  the 
body  which  they  are  to  inform  as  to  its 
correct  shape. 

Difficult  as  it  is  to  form  a  conception  of 
how  descent  in  the  first  step  is  controlled 
by  the  method  of  pangenesis,  the  further 
application  of  the  hypothesis  to  the  more 
extended  phenomena  of  inheritance  leads 
us  to  suppositions  which  are  not  only  im- 
possible of  conception,  but  appear  utterly 
to  transcend  the  powers  of  the  imagina- 
tion. Thus  when  we  find  in  human  kind 


2QO       IMMORTALITY  OF  THE  SOUL. 

superfluous  digits  from  time  to  time  ap- 
pearing, and  discover  that  these  excessive 
parts  have  the  power  of  growing  again 
after  they  have  been  removed  by  the 
knife,  we  are  forced  to  believe,  as  Mr. 
Darwin  has  so  well  shown,  that  the  ten- 
dency to  the  supernumerary  parts  as  well 
as  to  their  growth  after  they  have  been 
destroyed  is  due  to  the  persistence  in  man 
of  organic  motives  derived  from  ancestors 
characterized  by  polydactylic  extremities. 
But  as  these  many  fingered  and  toed 
beasts  are  separated  from  the  human 
race  by  millions  of  generations,  how  can 
these  gemmules  have  continued  in  being 
through  such  extended  series  of  transmis- 
sions ? 

Admirable  as  is  the  hypothesis  of  pan- 
genesis  when  considered  merely  as  a  dar- 
ing feat  of  the  scientific  imagination,  it  is 
evident  that  it  utterly  fails  to  satisfy  the 
first  conditions  of  a  theory,  namely,  that 
it  shall  bring  a  portion  of  the  unknown 
within  the  limits  of  the  understanding.  It 


PSYCHIC  ACTION.  29 1 

does  not  in  the  least  extend  or  simplify 
our  conception,  but  leaves  us  in  the 
densest  fog  of  speculation.  Although  this 
supplementary  element  of  Mr.  Darwin's 
hypothesis  has  in  general  failed  to  com- 
mend itself  to  philosophical  naturalists,  it 
has  in  an  indirect  way  been  of  much  ser- 
vice to  science.  It  has  forced  naturalists 
to  perceive  the  magnitude  and  difficulty  of 
the  problems  which  they  have  to  encoun- 
ter in  this  field  of  inquiry.  From  this  con- 
sideration they  are  naturally  brought  to  a 
state  of  mind  concerning  the  relations  of 
life  to  matter  which  is  very  different  from 
that  which  characterized  their  predeces- 
sors. It  is  difficult  to  set  forth  the  nature 
of  this  change  of  view  in  precise  phrase, 
but  the  modification  is  so  important  that 
we  must  now  essay  the  task. 

Until  the  phenomena  of  inheritance 
were  in  a  measure  appreciated,  biologists 
generally  considered  psychic  action  to  be 
a  mere  function  of  the  nervous  system  and 
to  owe  its  manifestations  to  some  peculiar- 


IMMORTALITY  OF  THE  SOUL. 

ity  in  the  structure  of  that  organic  part. 
They  regarded  the  mind  of  man  as  a  direct 
product  of  the  brain,  and  explained  the 
coincidences  which  we  find  among  all  the 
individuals  of  a  kind  as  fully  accounted  for 
by  the  likeness  in  the  machinery  of  this 
great  nerve  centre.  With  this  assumption, 
it  seemed  a  relatively  simple  and  direct 
conclusion  that  the  mental  qualities  could 
be  accounted  for  by  the  nature  of  the 
mechanism  which  produced  them.  It  was 
therefore  only  necessary  to  explain  the 
uniformity  in  structure  of  the  cerebral 
parts  in  order  sufficiently  to  explain  the 
origin  of  the  likeness  of  the  mental  phe- 
nomena in  man  or  any  other  species  of 
animal ;  they  had  but  to  suppose  a  law 
enforcing  the  shape  of  those  parts  to  ac- 
count for  the  uniformity  of  the  product. 
Here,  as  elsewhere,  they  covered  their  ig- 
norance by  the  use  of  that  most  question- 
begging  of  all  scientific  epithets,  "  law." 

The  facts  already  ascertained  concern- 
ing the  conditions  of  inheritance,  although 


MENTAL   QUALITIES.  293 

• 

they  are  only  a  small  part  of  what  we  have 
to  learn  in  the  matter,  show  us  clearly  that 
the  ancient  apparently  simple  explanation 
of  mental  phenomena  can  no  longer  be 
safely  trusted.  If  a  mechanical  explana- 
tion can  be  used  at  all,  it  must  be  vastly 
more  complicated  than  that  which  has 
been  hitherto  adduced.  It  is  clear  that  all 
the  essential  qualities  of  the  mind  pass 
from  generation  to  generation  over  the  re- 
productive bridge,  borne  onward  in  the 
keeping  of  chemical  molecules.  Although 
in  the  higher  forms  the  ovum  has  the  cell 
character,  in  all  species,  even  up  to  man, 
the  male  element,  which  is  at  least  as  po- 
tent as  the  female,  loses  its  cellular  struc- 
ture and  transmits  its  qualities  through 
its  molecular  organization  alone.  If  there 
be  any  organization  of  these  molecules 
other  than  that  of  a  purely  chemical  kind, 
the  fact  entirely  escapes  our  apprehension. 
It  is  moreover  in  a  high  degree  improbable 
that  any  such  unseen  shaping  actually  oc- 
curs. We  are  thus  forced  to  the  conclu- 


294       IMMORTALITY  OF  THE  SOUL. 

sion  that  the  ongoing  of  life  from  gener- 
ation to  generation  is  brought  about  in 
large  measure  by  influences  which  may  be 
given  over  for  transmission  to  the  simpler 
aggregates  of  matter.  We  have  to  sup- 
pose that  these  associations  of  atoms,  at 
most  a  few  score  or  a  few  hundred  in  num- 
ber, which  are  the  units  of  the  proto- 
plasmic mass,  can  effectively  contain  and 
transmit  the  important  elements  of  expe- 
rience acquired  by  myriads  of  ancestors  ; 
that  they  can  convey  this  experience  to 
other  molecules,  and  so  from  generation 
to  generation  of  the  molecular  series ;  that 
the  impulses  will  assert  themselves  at  the 
right  time  and  place  in  the  developing 
organism. 

The  way  in  which  the  generational 
transmission  is  effected  not  only  goes 
quite  beyond  our  field  of  knowledge,  but 
appears  also  to  transcend  the  limits  of  the 
scientific  imagination. 

There  is  only  one  conclusion  of  evident 
value,  at  least  at  the  present  time,  which 


LATENT  POWERS  OF  MATTER. 

we  can  gain  from  the  facts  above  noted, 
and  this  is  in  effect  that  matter,  even  in 
its  simpler  states  of  organization  in  the 
atom  or  molecule,  may  contain  a  practi- 
cally infinite  body  of  latent  powers.  So 
far,  of  course,  we  have  seen  this  soul-bear- 
ing capacity  of  matter  in  its  simpler  states 
only  in  the  organic  realm ;  but  he  would 
be  a  rash  man  who  should  affirm  that 
this  was  the  only  place  in  nature  where 
the  material  or  chemical  substances  were 
enabled  to  become  the  keepers  of  intellec- 
tual seed.  From  an  a  priori  point  of  view, 
and  without  reference  to  the  facts  which 
we  have  gained  concerning  the  sequences 
of  organic  life,  it  appears  to  me  less  diffi- 
cult to  suppose  the  capacities  of  an  indi- 
vidual mind  to  be  perpetuated  after  death, 
and  this  in  a  natural  manner,  than  to  ex- 
plain the  phenomena  of  inheritance  which 
are  clearly  indicated  in  the  organic  series. 
To  account  for  these  evident  truths  de- 
mands the  supposition  of  such  colossal 
potentialities  in  the  psychic  capacities  of 


2Q6       IMMORTALITY  OF  THE  SOUL. 

matter  that  we  can  hardly  see  a  limit  to 
the  field  of  its  possible  action. 

It  is  quite  beyond  the  province  of  the 
naturalist  to  suggest  any  ways  in  which 
intelligence,  parted  by  death  from  its 
habitation,  can  be  preserved;  he  has  no 
evidence  that  such  preservation  actually 
occurs.  He  should  be  the  last  man  to 
deny  that  the  vast  body  of  individual  ex- 
perience, which  seems  to  indicate  the 
existence  of  visible  forms  representing  the 
departed,  is  a  mere  mass  of  falsehoods ; 
he  can  only  say  that  the  conditions  of  all 
such  observations  are  such  as  make  any- 
thing like  scientific  inquiry  exceedingly 
difficult  if  not  quite  impossible.  It  is  too 
soon  to  say  what  may  come  forth  from  the 
devoted  inquiries  of  those  persons  who, 
in  certain  cases  well  trained  in  observa- 
tion, are  giving  their  lives  in  endeavor- 
ing to  verify  these  ancient  beliefs  in  ap- 
paritions. However,  to  the  cold-minded 
critic,  it  appears  doubtful  whether,  as  yet, 
any  substantial  basis  has  been  laid  on 


A   SCIENCE   OF  APPARITIONS.        2()J 

which  we  may  hope  to  base  conclusions 
of  affirmative  value.  Not  only  are  the 
reputed  phenomena  apparently  uncontrol- 
lable in  a  scientific  sense,  but  the  state 
of  mind  of  the  observer  appears  to  be  so 
inevitably  influenced  by  the  ancient  inher- 
ited emotions  which  induce  what  we  may 
term  the  superstitious  state  of  mind,  that 
he  is  necessarily  unfit  for  the  task  of 
gathering  data  in  the  moments  when  he 
should  be  in  the  most  rational  state. 

Although  naturalists  may  fairly  hope 
for  a  science  of  apparitions,  they  in  gen- 
eral feel  uncertain,  as  yet,  whether  this 
learning  will  not  show  the  phenomena  to 
be  due  altogether  to  the  action  of  the 
observer's  mind.  At  the  same  time  rea- 
sonable inquirers,  however  skeptical,  in 
the  original  sense  of  that  word,  may  fairly 
grant  that  if  certain  phenomena,  ap- 
parently well  observed,  can  be  verified  in 
the  critical  and  thoroughgoing  way  which 
the  difficulties  of  the  matter  make  neces- 
sary, we  will  then  have  some  slight  begin- 
nings of  an  altogether  new  science. 


298       IMMORTALITY  OF  THE  SOUL. 

While  the  evidence  which  he  is  now 
gathering  leads  the  thoughtful  naturalist 
greatly  to  limit  the  range  of  his  assertions 
as  to  the  possibilities  of  psychic  phenom- 
ena in  the  material  world,  the  effect  of  his 
studies  seems  to  be  to  decrease  rather  than 
to  increase  the  personal  interest  which  he 
is  likely  to  feel  in  the  question  of  immor- 
tality. In  part  this  influence  is  due  to 
the  vast  enlargement  of  the  present  which 
has  come  from  the  more  extended  know- 
ledge of  nature.  Every  well-informed 
observer  of  the  phenomenal  world  finds 
himself  day  by  day  more  concerned  with 
the  moment.  If  he  be  a  dutiful  man,  the 
sense  of  responsibility  with  reference  to 
immediate  action  is  so  great  that  he  in- 
stinctively puts  aside  every  consideration 
with  which  he  does  not  feel  himself 
obliged  to  deal.  This  vast  .extension  of 
thought  in  our  own  horizon,  in  the  plane 
of  our  daily  life,  has  in  a  way  forced  men 
to  dwell  less  upon  matters  of  the  here- 
after. We  are  in  the  position  of  soldiers 


THE  SPIRIT  OF  CONTENT.          299 

in  the  heat  of  battle  who  are  compelled 
to  act  with  reference  to  the  instant  until 
the  death-wound  sets  us  free. 

There  is  another  effect  which  bears  on 
the  interest  in  immortality,  one  derived 
from  the  close  study  of  nature,  which  is 
hard  to  set  forth  in  words.  When  the 
student  comes  to  feel,  as  the  intellectually 
prosperous  naturalist  always  does,  that  he 
is  part  of  a  vast  tide,  or  rather  a  portion 
of  a  gigantic  organization  which  is  mov- 
ing forward  steadfastly  in  the  control  of 
an  order,  of  a  purpose,  he  becomes  con- 
tent to  abandon  himself  to  the  power 
which  controls  his  action,  or  rather  we 
should  say  to  go  freely  and  energetically 
in  the  path  on  which  he  is  impelled,  with- 
out regard  to  the  goal,  but  with  perfect 
confidence  that  whatever  the  destination, 
it  is  in  all  senses  fit.  If  he  is  to  live  for- 
ever, that  life  will  be  good  for  the  whole ; 
if  he  is  to  be  extinguished  or  changed,  as 
are  the  mere  vibrations  of  matter,  then 
that,  too,  is  for  the  good  of  the  whole. 


300      IMMORTALITY  OF  THE  SOUL. 

It  would  be  easy  to  show  that  this  spirit 
of  content  with  the  universe  has  a  some- 
what religious  character.  The  change  in 
the  form  of  our  intellectual  lives  which 
has  led  men,  metaphorically  speaking,  to 
broaden  their  interests  in  the  horizontal 
plane  and  diminish  them  in  the  vertical, 
has  been  attended  by  a  growth  of  keener 
interest  in  our  fellow-men,  and  also  we 
may  say  in  our  fellow-nature.  Acting  in 
the  moment  and  for  the  best  interests  of 
their  kind,  there  is  no  loss,  there  is  rather 
a  gain,  in  the  sympathetic  element  of  life. 
Men  at  least  avoid  the  risk  of  that  hedon- 
ism which  Carlyle  well  describes  as  an 
effort  "to  save  their  dirty  little  souls." 
Good  as  have  been  many  of  the  effects 
of  the  endeavor  to  secure  a  blessed  im- 
mortality, it  is  clear  to  us  all  that  much 
wrong -doing,  much  obdurate  selfishness, 
has  come  from  the  greed  with  which  men 
have  sought  that  end.  The  content  with 
which  naturalists  accept  nature,  the  feel- 
ing that  this  nature  is  a  part  of  themselves 


CONTINUOUS   TRENDS.  30! 

and  they  of  it,  the  unexpressed  but  ever- 
existing  supposition  that  the  whole  is 
good,  is  closely  akin  to  the  reconciliation 
with  the  omnipotent  which  is  the  declared 
goal  of  most  religions.  In  it  there  is  some- 
thing of  the  peace  of  God  which  passeth 
understanding. 

There  is  yet  another  effect  arising  from 
the  study  of  nature  which  is  not  without 
its  influence  on  our  views  concerning  im- 
mortality. This  is  due  to  the  fact  that 
most  naturalists  acquire  a  kind  of  instinct 
which  leads  them  to  suppose  underlying 
purposes,  or  at  least  continuous  trends, 
in  the  course  of  universal  events.  Thus 
they  perceive  a  steadfast  progress  from 
the  lower  stages  of  inorganic  to  the  higher 
forms  of  organic  existence.  It  seems,  in 
a  way,  a  denial  of  the  observed  order  to 
suppose  that  the  series  is  interrupted  with 
the  death  which  overtakes  each  individual, 
and  which  must,  with  the  cooling  of  the 
suns,  overwhelm  all  the  higher  life  which 
the  planets  bear.  For  one,  I  cannot  help 


3<D2       IMMORTALITY  OF  THE  SOUL. 

looking  upon  absolute  death,  that  kind  of 
passing  away  which  would  leave  organic 
life  quite  without  issue,  as  in  a  way  offen- 
sive to  my  understanding,  and  in  a  mea- 
sure out  of  the  observed  order  of  phe- 
nomena. Clearly  the  trend  of  all  the  ages 
the  history  of  which  we  can  trace  has  led 
to  the  integration  of  energy  in  higher  in- 
telligence. It  is  a  most  unsatisfactory 
supposition  that  all  this  toil  and  pains  is 
to  be  without  fruit.  It  is  by  no  means 
certain  that  the  fit  harvest  is  personal  im- 
mortality ;  but,  so  far  as  we  can  see,  the 
unknown  continuation  of  the  known  is 
best  satisfied  by  the  hypothesis  that  life 
is  in  some  way  perpetuated,  with  all  the 
personal  profit  which  has  been  attained 
by  that  greatest  of  all  natural  results,  the 
individual  soul. 

We  may  sum  up  the  foregoing  consid- 
erations in  a  brief  way,  as  follows  :  the 
early  materialistic  conceptions  of  natural- 
ists, which  rested  upon  an  assumed  sim- 
plicity in  the  world  with  which  they  had 


SCIENTIFIC  FAITHS.  303 

to  deal,  have  of  late  been  greatly  shaken 
by  the  advance  of  their  knowledge.  In 
proportion  as  their  inquiries  have  ex- 
tended, they  have  been  compelled  to 
make  suppositions  concerning  the  action 
of  natural  forces  which  are  almost,  if 
not  quite,  as  mystical  as  those  which  of 
old  they  condemned  the  theologians  for 
holding.  As  the  labors  of  these  men  of 
science  have  accumulated,  they  have  be- 
gun to  develop  an  interesting  body  of  mo- 
tives and  instincts,  such  as  the  confidence 
in  nature  and  in  the  underlying  purpose- 
fulness  of  those  sequences  on  which  we 
found  the  so-called  laws.  These  motives 
lie  in  the  field  of  religion  ;  they  are  prop- 
erly to  be  called  faiths,  in  the  broader 
sense  of  the  word.  As  yet  the  develop- 
ment of  these  habitual  conceptions  derived 
from  the  study  of  nature  has  not  gone 
very  far ;  but  the  trend  is  sufficiently  clear 
to  make  it  plain  that  much  may  be  ex- 
pected in  the  way  of  spiritual  growth  from 
this  development  of  natural  science. 


304       IMMORTALITY  OF  THE  SOUL. 

It  is  not  likely  that  observational  meth- 
ods will  ever  give  us  much  help  in  deter- 
mining the  matter  of  fact  in  the  problem 
of  immortality.  It  would,  however,  be 
rash  and  unscientific  to  say  that  all  the 
phenomena  of  so-called  spiritualism  are 
the  result  of  fraud  or  self-deception.  Nat- 
uralists have  been  blamed  for  not  essay- 
ing inquiries  which  seem  to  give  a  hope 
of  finding  proof  that  the  human  soul  sur- 
vives death.  With  rare  exceptions,  scien- 
tific men  feel  little  or  no  interest  in  such 
studies.  Experience  shows  them  that  the 
field  is  not  one  which  can  be  profitably 
cultivated  with  their  instruments  of  in- 
quiry. Moreover,  they  are  overwhelm- 
edly  occupied  with  work  in  regions  where 
they  are  sure  of  their  harvest,  and  where 
each  day's  gain  is  replete  with  profit  to 
their  fellow-men. 

It  cannot  be  denied  that  the  naturalists' 
way  of  regarding  the  facts  of  life  and 
death  has  a  certain  narrowness.  This  fea- 
ture, however,  is  inherent  in  the  system 


THE  NATURALISTIC  PROVINCE.    305 

which  they  pursue ;  it  has  to  be  taken  as 
the  defect  of  their  quality.  It  seems  to 
me  to  be  the  province  of  religion,  or  at 
least  one  of  its  many  duties,  to  consider 
the  moral  individual,  both  as  regards  im- 
mediate and  remote  action,  from  a  point 
of  view  which  the  student  of  physical  na- 
ture does  not  occupy  ;  from  which,  indeed, 
the  conditions  of  his  work  in  a  measure 
debar  him.  Although  the  naturalist  rec- 
ognizes emotions  as  important  facts,  he 
cannot  give  them  a  large  place  in  the  labo- 
ratory of  his  understanding.  His  province 
is  the  evident  and  the  ponderable.  It  is 
for  those  who  approach  the  problems  of 
life  on  other  paths  to  apply  the  truths 
which  the  study  of  nature  affords  in  all 
that  relates  to  the  moral  conduct  of  men. 
It  is  rather  for  them  to  judge  how  impor- 
tant is  the  belief  in  immortality  to  the 
conduct  of  life ;  it  is  for  them  to  gather 
the  evidences  in  support  of  this  belief,  and 
to  enforce  the  view  upon  mankind. 


14  DAY  USE 

RETURN  TO  DESK  FROM  WHICH  BORROWED 

LOAN  DEPT. 

This  book  is  due  on  the  last  date  stamped  below,  or 

on  the  date  to  which  renewed. 
Renewed  books  are  subject  to  immediate  recall. 


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General  Library 

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